Surviving
by QueenBrooke
Summary: "Katniss will choose whoever she thinks can't survive without." She thinks she can survive without anyone, though. She knows she can. Mockingjay, pre-epilogue
1. no more happy stories

**I'm random, and have no idea what shape this will take. It may be a one-shot, but I'm hoping it'll evolve into more.**

**Enjoy!**

**Oh, and I don't own the Hunger Games. **

_Katniss will choose whoever she thinks she can't survive without._

She thinks of these words long after they're spoken: can't stop thinking of the cold, calculating truth of them, the cold, calculating truth of her own heart. Gale's words swill in her brain the same way she's swilling white liquor in her glass as she sits on her couch in Victor's Village, unwilling to drink and unwilling to put it down and go to bed. She's not ready to succumb to nightmares, not ready to get drunk enough to block them out, not ready to stay up until the sun rises.

…_whoever she thinks she can't survive without_.

She thinks she can survive without anyone, though. She knows she can. She doesn't need people. She needs food, needs her bow and arrow, needs shelter, somewhere to stay warm…there are a lot of things she needs to survive, but none of them are people. She doesn't need Gale, doesn't need Peeta, Haymitch, her father, her mother, Prim…oh, Prim…

She's suddenly choking, sobbing on her couch in the middle of the night, sloshing back the alcohol and choking harder, spilling it everywhere. _Prim_. If there was ever anyone she truly needed, it was Prim, but Prim is gone and she's still here: empty, lonely, insane, but still here. Which just proves her point: she does not need people to survive.

As if on cue, Peeta enters her house, quietly, but it's Peeta, so of course she hears him. She looks at him, from where she's sitting, liquor on her shirt, on her cheeks. It's starting to go to her head because she tossed it back so hastily. He stares at her, appearing to be in better shape, but would he be here if he were in better shape?

"I couldn't," he says simply. She raises an eyebrow. "It's quiet and empty and…" he trails off, but of course she doesn't need him to finish to know what he means. Their houses are empty but they're not, because they're full of ghosts. They've lost everyone, it seems, and it's come to this: him standing by her door, expecting her to reject the simplest offer: her, half-drunk on her couch with tearstains on her cheeks.

There's a moment where she looks at his hands and remembers how they feel wrapped around her hands. She thinks of the star-crossed lovers on the couch after the first Games and thinks of how far they've travelled, if moving steadily backwards counts as travelling. It must, she thinks, it must count, but she can't understand why she thinks this. He's still standing at her door, and she hasn't answered him, and she wonders, not for the first time, if she's gone insane.

"Sit," she tells him, motioning with her glass as she gets up. She gets another glass and brings the bottle to the coffee table. He's sitting with his knees curled into his chest, shivering, and she would ask him if he's cold, but she knows he's not. She knows what it's like to sit, shivering, for hours in the middle of the summer. She knows.

She pours both of them a glass, and they don't look at each other as they tip them back. They're both hoping for a dreamless sleep, both desperately fending off the nightmares with a slightly lesser evil. This has been Haymitch's course of action, and thus far, neither of them has found a better one. She pours more, her hands shaking, though whether it's from alcohol or loss or the loneliness she feels with him beside her, she's not sure. He looks at her, taking the glass, not drinking.

"Tell me something?" he asks. "Tell me a story I'd like."

She sighs.

"I don't have any stories left," she whispers. She's tired, but she so desperately does not want to sleep.

"None that you'd like. You tell a story. Tell about me singing when I had the two braids."

She sips the liquor this time, hoping it will make her feel warm. They're both shivering now.

"We were at school," he says. He's shaking. "You had two braids in your hair, not like this." He touches her hair, touches the end of her braid, and then they're kissing and neither of them knows how.

She feels wetness on her cheeks and she thinks she's crying until she realizes they are his tears. She pulls away, swallows the rest of her liquor, puts her hand on his cheek.

"This isn't a sad story," she whispers, but she knows it is. They were innocent then. They had their sanity, they didn't stay up all night, hoping there would be no nightmares that would tear them apart until they couldn't breathe, knowing they would never escape.

"All of our stories are sad," he whispers back, following her train of thought, as he always does. He pulls her to him, and her head fits perfectly on his shoulder. It always has. She remembers those children again: children who had never killed anyone, hadn't caused any wars, hadn't fallen in love and then out of it again. She sighs into his shoulder; he's still crying and she knows he feels lonely. She can't press herself closer, can't risk shattering what's left of her mind and her heart. They've taken so much and she can't give the rest to him. She needs it for herself. She doesn't need him to survive. She needs herself to survive.

"Can I sleep here tonight?" he asks, gasping. He's so broken, and she wipes her hand over his cheek. She's broken too.

"Take my bed," she tells him. "I'm not sleeping tonight."

He nods, because of course he understands not sleeping; understands that exhaustion is a small price to pay for no nightmares. He kisses her cheek, so quickly she might have imagined it, because she's not sure of anything right now. She lies on the couch, forsaking her glass to drink straight from the bottle.

She doesn't know what to do: she wants to go over the facts in her head, like she did in the revolution, but all she can remember is that her name is Katniss, because after that she wants to think that she lives in District 12, which can't be right, there is no District 12. She wants to think that she loves Peeta, but that can't be right either, because she knows she should love him, and she isn't any good at doing what she should.


	2. screams in the night

**So…not a oneshot!**

**Courixoxo: thanks so much for your review! It made my whole day **

**I don't own the Hunger Games. **

She lets the alcohol pull her under when she can't keep the facts straight. She's lying on the couch, trying so hard not to sleep, but she fails. She always fails when it matters. She succeeds when there can be two victors. When only one of them can be rescued, that's when she fails. When it comes to preventing his pain, preventing him from being captured and tortured, she's useless. Why the hell did she let him out of her sight? She can't remember because since the moment they separated at the Cornucopia in the first Games, she can't remember a time she truly _felt_ separate from him…

_Prim's walking towards her, and she tries to scream, to warn her that it's a trap, but nothing comes out of her throat. She's choking over her own words, words she can't get out, and Prim walks past wildflowers exactly like the wildflowers that she laid on Rue's grave. Prim is singing, about a man hanging from a tree, and Katniss wants to tell her that they can't sing that song but she can't tell her because she can't breathe. Prim's walking into the trap, and Katniss can't remember what the trap is until the fire starts, coming between them, and Prim is screaming, and Katniss is running to her but it's so hot, and then there's no fire, just charred flesh everywhere. She sorts through it, quickly, no time to stop and think or apologize, because it's all her fault, it's always her fault. She won't accept Prim is dead until someone proves it, until she finds her body, but there are no whole bodies here, just pieces. 'I don't want to be just another piece in their Games', she thinks, and where the hell is Peeta? He's the only one who knows what that means…_

_ And then Peeta is there, and she's so relieved, because he'll protect her, that's what they do. And she wants to sink into him, but he's looking too, looking for his family, and then he looks at her, and she sees that this isn't Peeta, it is but it isn't, because he's been taken from her. This is not the real Peeta. Not real. Not real. But it's too late, because his hands are closing over her throat, and his hands are on fire, or made of fire…Girl on Fire…she can't breathe, she's choking, she might die, she might finally die…_

She wakes gasping for air, choking on nothing, disorientated not because she's sleeping on the couch but because this has never been her home. The sun hasn't risen yet, so she didn't sleep for long, but she slept, and she hadn't meant to. She'd told Peeta she wouldn't. Why is she always lying to him?

She's angry, more angry than scared, because even now, she's still a piece in their Games. Her nightmares are always about the people she loves most: Prim, her mother, Peeta, Gale, Haymitch, her father…They're never about people she hates. And on top of that, they're never simple flashbacks of the hell she's already been through. Instead they twist reality until she can't breathe, until everything seems worse, and it was pretty damn awful to begin with. She hates that now, so far removed, she is still a piece in their Games: they tell her when to sleep, when to drink, who to love. Or who not to love, because she can't love this hijacked shell of who Peeta was. She can't love a boy who wraps his hands around her throat in her nightmares. It would break her and she's already broken.

She listens for him now, because he must have heard her screaming. She always screams in her sleep. She can't hear him, figures he must not want to check on her, must not want to get dragged into her darkness because he's got enough darkness on his own. She wishes he would come to her, because her nightmares are so much better when he's there. She likes having him there when she wakes, the real Peeta, not the one from her nightmares. He can comfort her as no one else can, better even than Prim: his hands know where to hold her because he knows what she's been through. He's the only one who knows where it hurts. But he didn't come to her, now, as she screamed and writhed on the couch. And it doesn't matter, because she's not going back to sleep, so he doesn't need to hold her.

She sighs and pads into the kitchen, making coffee and waiting as it drips into the pot. They get supplies delivered here once a month and they had originally given all the coffee to Haymitch, since it helps with hangovers. But little by little, she had begun taking the coffee. And then Peeta had too, never telling Haymitch that they weren't taking it for hangovers, but because it helped them evade sleep, evade the monsters in their nightmares.

She hears a noise from upstairs and listens, carefully. Peeta's never quiet: he mutters in his sleep, talks too much while he's awake, scares away game when he walks. But he's not muttering in his sleep, he's screaming. She thinks about going to him, but he didn't come to her, and what would she offer him anyways? Not comfort: his nightmares are probably about her. She just makes coffee, sits at the table to sip it, listening to him scream.

Eventually it stops and she hears him coming down the stairs, so she pours him a mug. The sun hasn't risen but neither of them are going back to sleep. He stands in the entranceway of her kitchen, leaning against the wall. He's covered in sweat. He just stares at her, drinking her in. She finishes fussing over their coffees and meets his gaze. She can see, without needing words, that he dreamt she was dead and that right now he just needs to see her, alive, still breathing, not on fire, and that's what will comfort him. After what feels like an eternity, he comes to the table, takes the coffee with a nod, and they sit together in silence.

There's nothing to say now, in the dark, both of them trying not to think of their own nightmares and each other's screams. They both sip their coffee. They sip coffee and gulp liquor; that's what they do. The Boy with the Bread. The Girl on Fire.

_Katniss will choose whoever she thinks she can't survive without._

She can survive without him. She can, but she wants him near. Not because she _needs_ him (she doesn't need anyone) but because the house is so much less empty when he's here. When he's here, she knows he's not a ghost, and it comforts her. Maybe she needs comfort.

"You should move in," she tells him. He looks at her, and she sees he can't tell what she means, what, exactly, she's asking him for.

"We have huge houses, and they're empty," she explains. "There are lots of bedrooms. You could have the spare bedroom upstairs." She can't offer her mother's or Prim's, because Prim is dead and her mother might as well be.

"I have stuff," he says, abruptly. He's struggling, she can tell: he's not sure if this is real or not real. "Paints, and baking supplies, and…I have lots of stuff."

"I don't have stuff," she tells him. "Not really. I'd like…stuff here. That'd be…it'd be less empty."

He nods. He knows what it's like to have an empty house, even with all of his stuff. And so, before the sun has risen, they've moved his stuff into her house: his clothes and baking supplies, his paints and his easels. She started moving his canvases, but she saw the one with Rue and burst into tears. After that he moved them, putting all of them into the office downstairs, turning it into a studio, and she organized his things in the kitchen. By the time the sun is rising, it doesn't feel so empty anymore. She knows it is empty, save for ghosts, but it doesn't _feel _that way. And with her house a little less empty, she begins to feel as if maybe, maybe, she won't always be so empty.


	3. not as empty

**The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins, not to me, though I do enjoy playing with her characters. **

_Katniss will choose whoever she thinks she can't survive without._

The words are swilling again, going round and round in her head. The more they whirl around and around the more they make her see how cold she is, how heartless. And not just now, after Games and wars and fires, when she maybe she has a right to be heartless. She was always heartless. She had used him, to ward off nightmares, to protect her from Snow, to keep appearances up. She had used him because without him, her trick with the berries would've been self-destructive, would've been as rebellious as the Capitol thought it was.

She wonders if she loves him now, if she's ever loved him. She remembers how it felt when he was taken, when he belonged to the Capitol. She remembers him trying to choke her; she can't escape those memories if she lets herself sleep. She knows she can survive without love; that her survival doesn't depend on loving him, so she lets herself wonder. She lies in bed alone, cold, craving something warm, something _more_, and she lets herself wonder if she ever loved him, if he was always just a piece in her Games.

She remembers him calling her a piece of work, when Haymitch's voice was constantly in her ear, when she had a firmer grip on reality, when Prim was still alive. But she doesn't remember if it was good or bad. She _is _a piece of work. She has been from the moment he tossed her the bread. And so why was that bad? Why was it so bad for him to see her clearly, to see that she isn't very big or very pretty? She's not. She's none of the things he thought she was when he fell in love with her, so why does it matter that he sees that?

He's loud and it makes her house seem less haunted, or maybe just haunted by something different. She welcomes it, because sometimes she likes change. Sometimes change means two victors, not just one. She embraces the noises he brings to her house: paintbrushes knocking against jars, against easels; pans banging together as he bakes, his laugh, which only happens when she's with him. The house reverberates when he walks because he's just so damn big and she welcomes the change from her quiet, hunter's footsteps. She even welcomes his screams, during the night, to an extent, because at least she's not the only one screaming. At least she's not alone.

Haymitch, whose visits were always unpredictable, barges into her house one day yelling. He can't find Peeta, searched the entire house, hasn't seen a light on in there for days...

"Where is he?" demands Haymitch, grabbing her by the shoulders, shaking her. She can't tell how drunk he is because he always smells like liquor.

"You have to protect him," Haymitch tells her, "You have to look out for him, please tell me you've been looking out for him. Where is he?"

Peeta comes out of his studio, holding a jar of water that's turning blue with his paintbrush. His eyebrows are raised and she can see he's struggling not to smile.

"Didn't know you cared so much, old man," he teases Haymitch, and Haymitch stares at him, then Katniss, then him again.

"What the hell's going on here?" he demands, but Katniss suddenly smells burning and remembers she's cooking a rabbit. She runs into the kitchen, saves it just in time, and heads back out to the entryway, where Peeta is grinning and Haymitch still looks confused.

"You moved in together?" he demands, because it doesn't surprise him that Peeta would want in her house, it surprises him that Katniss would let him in, let him stay. Another reminder of her heartlessness, that she will choose who she thinks she thinks she needs, not who she thinks she loves.

"It's not as quiet when he's around," she tells him, simply. Peeta gives her a surprised look. She's not sure what he was hoping for, but that wasn't it. Haymitch is looking at her like she's an idiot.

"Come eat," she tells them, both of them, glaring at Haymitch so he'll know he's included. They make their way to the kitchen, where she's mashed potatoes and put some of Peeta's rolls on the table along with the rabbit. She pours them water, and they dig in enthusiastically.

"When was the last time you ate?" she asks Haymitch. She's blunt, doesn't have enough energy to be tactful.

"I dunno," he mutters, glaring daggers at her as he scoops himself more potatoes. "Why do you care?"

"Because if you starve to death, we won't have a mentor," explains Peeta quietly. He always follows her thoughts so precisely, and she has never been able to decide whether she likes it or not. Haymitch snorts.

"I haven't been your mentor for awhile," he tells them, scraping his plate clean. They both roll their eyes. He stands to leave, and Katniss, in a wave of fondness she didn't know was still in her, walks him to the door.

"You're still our mentor," she tells him quietly, hoping Peeta won't hear. "We may not be in the arena, but we're just as close to death." He looks at her then, sees how sunken her face is, how tired she looks. He sighs, knowing this look himself, but not knowing how to help her.

"Take care of him," Haymitch tells her, quietly, so Peeta won't hear. Why are they always hiding from each other? "He needs you."

She rolls her eyes, opens the door so he'll leave, leave and never say that again. He kisses her forehead, making her think of her father, but her father made her feel safe, whereas Haymitch is just drunk.

"Come back when you get hungry," she yells at his retreating figure. He waves, though she's not sure what that means.

When she makes her way back to the kitchen, she sees Peeta is already doing the dishes. He doesn't need her. He can't need her. She can't need him. They can't need things anymore.


	4. real or not real

**Lovely people: thank you so much for the reviews! Though I'm generally not one to ask for them or get hung up on whether people review or not, I'm always so grateful for those who take the time to tell me what they think. It honestly makes my day! **

**The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins, not to me, though I do enjoy playing with her characters. **

They live together for two weeks before he has an episode. She's to the point where she thinks they've stopped, thinks he's all better, which is insane. She felt like her sanity was coming back, but clearly not if she thought a couple good weeks could make anything about them all better. Maybe she's not insane; she's just an idiot.

It happens as the sun is rising. She's lying in bed, awake from a nightmare where she couldn't stop seeing Finnick's eyes, seeing the last look he gave her, and she wakes up choking because the scent of roses is everywhere. It takes her a long time, lying in the darkness, to believe that it doesn't smell like roses, just like her: sweat and leaves. She likes it because it grounds her, makes her think of the woods, makes her think of safety. She thinks about going downstairs to get coffee or some food, but she doesn't want to wander around in the dark, so she just lies in her bed, her hand on her ribs to be sure she's still breathing, and tries to sort through facts in her mind. Peeta screams in his sleep, and she hears him moan, a terrible sound, like something inside of him is breaking. She stays where she is, as she always does, resisting the urge to go to him. She listens to him get out of bed and head downstairs, and she waits to hear his footsteps in the kitchen, making coffee, baking something. But she waits and waits, and the sun is still rising, and she can't hear anything. That can't be right because Peeta is so loud, and suddenly she feels the same stillness she did in the first Games, when she lost track of him and she could hear nothing, no wind to shake the trees, no answer to her signal, nothing at all until the cannon boomed and she started screaming.

She races downstairs, remembering that he was close to death then, sure he is close to death now. An arrow is already notched in the string of her bow, and she is trying to be silent but she knows she's making noise. Less noise than the last time this happened, because she hasn't screamed yet, so she considers it a victory. She's creeping into the kitchen, somehow believing that Snow is here, that he's hurting Peeta again, and she will kill him, she will kill him, she will…

She lowers her bow and turns, silently, to the living room. Peeta is alone, and he's silent but shaking, curled into a ball on the floor, his back to her couch. She stares at him, then presses herself against the wall as he shakes more violently and she sees that he's silent because he's stuffed his fist in his mouth, biting down. She wants to tell him that he doesn't have to do that, that she's heard him scream hundreds of times, but she can't speak, can't move. She watches as he shudders with memories, real and not real, and she has no idea what to do.

He shakes more violently, tilting toward the floor and his hands go out to catch himself, and he's making noises she's never heard: he's choking, but moaning, and it sounds as if he wants to scream but doesn't remember how. She can barely recognize this shell of Peeta: the boy with the bread is nowhere in sight. She doesn't know why, but suddenly, she finds herself dropping her bow and going to him, though surely she is the last person he wants.

She sinks to the floor beside him, and she's scared, because she can't stop remembering how his fingers feel on her throat. She's trying to think of better things, like burned bread and kisses and how his hands feel wrapped around hers, but the feel of his fingers around her neck keeps pushing through, forcing her to face it. She touches his shoulder, and he looks at her, looks through her for a moment, before he sees she's really there. There's a moment where nothing moves, neither of them breathing, and then he's grabbed her and pushed her underneath him, resting on his forearms. He's not crushing her, but he's strong, and she suddenly realizes how stupid this was, that he was programmed to kill her, and that now she's underneath him with nowhere to go.

He reaches toward her and she closes her eyes, sure this is it, the end she's dreamed about so many times, but he doesn't choke her. He touches her cheek, so gently it feels like a dream.

"Real or not real?" he asks, his fingers on her cheek. She stares at him, sees how far away he is.

"Real," she tells him. "Real. Real. Come back to me, please come back to me, please come back to me, please…"

She's crying, and he feels her tears on his fingers, pulls away to examine them more closely. And then he's collapsed, on top of her, his face on her chest, and she thinks he's sobbing but she can't be sure.

"They told me…they made me think…"  
"Not real," she tells him. "Not real."  
"I watched you kill my family," he says, and now she knows he's sobbing. "I watched it."  
"Not real," she tells him, and she says it over and over as he sobs. "Not real."

Finally he shudders and lies still, but he's so big, so heavy, that she squirms, until he realizes what she's doing and sits up, pulling her into his lap. She wipes the tears from his face as he looks at her, drinking her in.

"You pretended to love me. Real or not real?"

She gapes at him, because she doesn't know what to say. She can barely remember this herself, is barely regaining her grasp on sanity. She can barely sort through her memories, still has no idea how much she was pretending and how much she really felt. Real or not real? He's looking at her, expecting an answer.

"Real," she chokes out, quickly followed by, "Not real. Real. Not real. Real. Not real. Real…"

She can't decide, can't make up her mind, feels like she's pulling petals off a flower hoping for the one that will decide it for her. He loves me, loves me not, loves me, loves me not…He loves her, she knows: he does or he did or he wants to. That one she knows, that one she can figure out, but real or not real?

She's sobbing, and without meaning to, she curls into him, her head on his shoulders, her legs around his waist, and he's soothing her. She doesn't know how they switched so quickly, how this all happened so quickly, can't remember how it started. He rubs her back but doesn't say anything, because he's desperately sorting through real and not real, and she is useless to him. She's like an ally in the Games that you didn't want but have to drag along because of some long-forgotten promise that is probably meaningless anyways.


	5. stupid

**Lovely people: thank you so much for the reviews! I'm so honoured by the number of people who have put this on their list of favourite stories. Thank you! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

Things are awkward when they pull themselves together and head to the kitchen. She makes coffee, he spreads butter on rolls, but neither of them speaks. They stay at the table, long past their usual time, and she should go hunting and he should paint or bake or something. But they stay seated, trying not to look at each other but unable to look away. Finally, she speaks.

"Real," she tells him, and though her answer is far too late, she knows he'll know what she means.

"I thought so," he told her, "I have so many memories of that—kisses and hand-holding—did we get engaged?"

She can't help it; she giggles at the question, and then he is laughing too. She isn't sure why she's laughing: she doesn't laugh anymore. But she feels so much relief that he's focusing on the charade, on the silliness the Capitol enforced, and not the fact that she was faking the whole time. She was faking the whole time, wasn't she?

"Most girls would be a little put off if their fiancé couldn't remember that," she teases him and he grins.

"You've never been 'most girls'," he reminds her, and she has a fleeting moment where she feels like she needs him, but it passes.

"I should go, hunt, you know—feed us?" she tells him, still teasing. She likes teasing him because she likes his smile. He looks like a different person when he smiles.

"You do that," he tells her, clearing their plates and cups. "I'll just be here, baking and doing dishes, all day long."  
"We're not your average couple, are we?" she asks as she heads out the door, and then she realizes what she's said but she doesn't need to go back, the door is closed and she doesn't have to see his face.

Stupid, she thinks, one of the stupidest things she's done. They are not a couple.

She wanders the woods for hours, not wanting to go back because she'll have to face Peeta and her stupid, _stupid_ comment. They are _not _a couple: they never really were, even when they were mostly whole, so why the hell would they be now? She checks all of her snares, walking too far until she's aching from exhaustion because she usually takes a break halfway through her snare line. She's too frantic and anxious to sit still. She finally heads back as the sun is setting, turning everything a beautiful, glowing orange, Peeta's favorite. She needs to go back because her woods don't feel safe in the dark. It's like a graveyard and she's not ready to dig anything up yet.

Peeta has already baked a meat pie when she gets home, and though one glance tells her he used two birds to do it, she's still grateful because it smells amazing. Her mouth is watering just looking at it on the counter where it's cooling, and then she sees that he's poured water and set the table, but she doesn't see him anywhere.

She's on edge in an instant, her dinner forgotten, bow and arrow in hand, and she's sure, again, that they're going to take him from her. She knows that they remember how to hurt her; they still know his piece of their Games is tangled inextricably with hers, that nothing else hurts her as much as his pain. She knows that they know her secret, the one she holds close to her heart and never says aloud: that her survival would mean nothing without him.

There's no one on the main floor, so she ascends the stairs silently, seeing Peeta's door is open. She's barely breathing as she rounds the corner, her muscles taut, ready to let her arrow fly into Snow's heart.

But of course, Snow isn't there: he's dead, that was real. It's just Peeta, shaking, curled into a ball, sounding as if he's swallowing a razorblade. He's covered in something, paint, she thinks, and he's trembling so violently she wonders if he's having a seizure, like her mother's patients did sometimes. She drops the bow and arrow, goes to him, sighing because she knows that this is stupid, knows he was brainwashed to hurt her, but she just can't watch him fall apart like this.

She touches his shoulder.

She's underneath him in an instant, just like last time, his body hovering over hers. He touches her cheek, her lips, her neck, just one finger, running down her throat, and she knows she should be scared but she isn't. The thought of losing him, even this shell of him, is what haunts her, not the thought of him hurting her again.

"Real," she tells him, since she knows where this is going.

"Yes," he whispers, his hand on her cheek now. "I lost my leg, real or not real?"  
"Real," she tells him; she can feel the prosthetic just above her own leg.

"I almost died, real or not real?" he whispers, and though she's not sure which occasion he's referring to, she whispers back, "Real."

His finger runs along her throat, and it makes no sense, because what she feels is the opposite of fear. She feels this thing, this _attraction_, welling up in her, making her warmer than she was a second ago. His finger leaves a tingling trail of fire on her throat and she gasps in pleasure without meaning to. He's too busy sorting memories to notice.

"I tried to choke you," he whispers. "Real or not real?"  
"Real," she tells him, he sighs, collapsing on her again. He looks up this time, whispers, "Is this okay?" and when she nods, he buries his face in her chest. She strokes his hair absently, wondering what the hell is wrong with her that she still feels something for this broken boy, who she should never have fallen for in the first place.


	6. can't stop remembering

**Thanks for all the favorite-ing I'm getting all over the place, lovely people- it makes me so happy. **

**ilikebread1: he's come out of his episode at the end, and is just making sure she's comfortable with him lying on her. Thanks for checking. **

**I feel like things pick up a bit after this chapter, and like I should apologize for how slow it's going. I just feel that Katniss wouldn't get her sanity or her feelings for Peeta back overnight (as a couple of you have mentioned). So, thanks for sticking with me! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

When he's pieced himself together enough to get off her, she's brave enough to ask, "What brought this on?"

They were happy this morning, she remembers, but she made that stupid comment about being a couple and in the back of her mind, she's wondering if this is her fault. He looks at her, weighing her, then pulls her to her feet. He doesn't let go of her hand, and she feels it again: this thing, this swooping in her stomach that makes her heart beat faster and her face go red. She focuses on these physical signs, because if she makes it all about her body it won't hurt as much as when it's really all about her heart.

He walks her to his studio and whispers, "Close your eyes."  
"Hell no," is her response, immediately. She doesn't close her eyes anymore: that's how nightmares happen.  
"Trust me," he whispers, putting his fingers on her eyelids, and she obeys because she's shocked to find that she does, she trusts him. She's even more shocked by this than his echo of the words she used when she pulled out the berries. She doesn't want to trust him, but she does. After all, he's always been the trustworthy one: she's the liar.

"Okay," says Peeta, after he's bumped around a bit and he puts an arm around her waist, to guide her. She's blushing again at his touch, her heart racing. She doesn't know where this has come from and can't decide if she likes it or not.  
"Okay," he says again, and he points towards a sheet in the corner draped over what looks like a pile of canvases. The sheet has one word painted on it: Games.

"Those you can't look at," Peeta tells her. "Those will give you nightmares, and bring you back into the arena, and…" He trails off, but she's looking at him, wondering when this happened, when he became the strong one who has to hide things from her weakness and fear. But she nods, a puppet on a string, a string that's tied to him and will do anything to make him smile. He looks like a different person when he smiles.

"This is what brought on the episode," he tells her, and he points to the painting on the easel. It's of Finnick and Annie on their wedding day. They're looking happy and vaguely scattered. She remembers how hard Plutarch pushed for a Capitol wedding, how their genuine love kept it from becoming Capitol-esque, how mixed-up and beautiful all of it was. She reaches for it, wanting to touch Annie's cheek, Finnick's eyes, which he's captured so perfectly, but Peeta stops her.

"Still wet," he reminds her, and she nods, looking at how his hand engulfs hers, makes her look weak and beautiful.

"I was painting him and I couldn't stop remembering," he whispers, and she's drawn into his blue eyes. She can't stop remembering either.

"What it was like, when he was screaming, and how different his eyes looked—"  
"Stop," she begs, and she actually puts a hand over his mouth because she can't handle even one more word. He pulls her hand away, nodding, understanding. Then, without a word, he kisses her hand, gently, but it sets her on fire. She gasps again, feeling this welling of emotion over this boy. Her boy with the bread.

"We should have dinner," he whispers, and she nods, not trusting her voice. She trusts her voice about as much as she trusts her heart.

They talk while they eat, carefully skirting around the difficult topics and focusing on the mundane: what the next shipment of supplies will bring, what they will cook for Haymitch when it comes, whether they should do laundry tomorrow or the day after. Safe topics, topics that don't hit too many sensitive spots: though of course, food is a sensitive spot, Haymitch always will be, supplies are, now that they're living together. Why are they living together again? Because she could've sworn she was surviving just fine on her own without any of this blushing and having feelings all over the place.

She lies alone in bed that night, cold, and thinks of his heat as he hovered over her, as he laid on her. He's always so warm and he's _so_ big; when she cuddles into him it feels as though she disappears, as though they can't find her because she's hidden against his chest. She remembers feeling this way in the first Games, as though no one could hurt her when he was protecting her.

She's lying in bed alone, wondering if she loves him, wondering if she wants there to be two victors, if that's what she wanted all along. Or if she is as heartless as Gale supposed, if she is incapable of love, if they've burned that away along with everything else. If she so desperately wants to be the only victor that she would let him swallow the berries without her.

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	7. closer to her darkness

**Thanks to everyone who reviewed or added this to their list of favourite stories. **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

They carry on in this pattern for several weeks: Peeta will push himself, whether it's a painting of Annie and Finnick or of Rue, whether it's weeding the primrose bushes or adding cinnamon to bread like his mother did, something will set him off, remind him of the past, and she'll find him rocking back and forth, choking on nothing, terrified and lost and altogether broken. She's stopped thinking Snow is there physically, stopped pulling out her bow and arrow every time Peeta goes quiet. And she's stopped believing that he could hurt her. The only way he can hurt her is disappearing.

Her pattern of pulling him out of them never varies: she sinks down beside him, touches his shoulder, and he pulls her quickly, desperately, underneath him. Then he will touch her face, her neck, her shoulder, her hair; something to ground himself, and they'll play real or not real until something brings him back to himself, shaking and sobbing on top of her. She knows that their enemies are getting everything they hoped for in the emptiness behind his eyes, the way he can't focus, the way he shudders on top of her afterwards, unable to breathe unless he's buried in her. Her scent seems to soothe him so one night, before he's gone to bed, she switches one of his pillows with her own. Neither of them mentions it the next day, because she's embarrassed to admit that his scent soothes her too, that she buried her face in his pillow and thought about what it felt like when he kissed her on the beach.

Finally, she gets frustrated, when she comes home one day after hunting to find a painting of a mutilated Boggs on his easel and one of President Snow himself sitting on the coffee table. She shrieks when she sees it and he raises an eyebrow at her from where he is in the kitchen, cinnamon bread on the table, milk poured, and she sees that he is frosting cupcakes the way his father used whenever his sons had birthdays. What the hell are they even going to do with cupcakes?

She slams her game bag on the table, her bow and quiver following.

"What the hell are you doing?" she demands, and he passes her a cupcake. She throws it at the wall. That gets his attention. Her screams do nothing for him, but God forbid she mess up a little frosting.

"I'm baking," he tells her, "and painting. What does it look like I'm doing?"

"It looks like you're trying to push yourself into another episode," she challenges, chin raised. He may be more talented, charismatic, an all-around better person, but she will always win in a fight, because she is meaner. She can tell she's hit the right spot by the way his jaw tightens.

"You have to stop," she tells him, walking towards him, taking the knife from his hand and throwing it into the sink. She likes throwing things when she's mad.

"I'm sick of coming home to paintings that are _designed_ to toss you over the edge or to have you _trying_ to haul your parents' ghosts into our house. What are you doing?"

He says nothing, waiting, biding his time. Or maybe he just can't speak because he won't lie to her. Because he wants to protect her.

"Do you think this is fun for me?" she asks, taunting. "To come home to you rocking back and forth, to have you ask me _stupid_ questions as you sort through reality, to have you collapse on me every single time?"

"Do you think this is fun for _me_?" he yells, losing his temper as she describes his weakness this way. She was expecting to feel regret or shame but she feels nothing but victory over having brought him a little closer to her darkness.

"Do you think I like losing control? That I like being brought out of them by you every time? Do you think I'm enjoying this?"

"It would seem that you are," she tells him, caustically, poison in her voice, "since you are _trying_ to make them happen, Peeta! You want them to happen and I don't know why you're so goddamn intent on torturing us, but if you could lay off for—"

"Excuse me for not wanting to live like this," he hisses, "for trying to find a breaking point so it'll stop or I'll make progress or _something_. Forgive me for trying to force myself to work through it so I'll know what's real and not real for next time!"

"But you don't remember!" she screams. Her cheeks are hot with her anger, her throat tight, but she can't seem to stop.

"You ask me the same things, time and time again. I don't think there is a breaking point, Peeta, there's just you, pinning me down asking me: 'Did we get married? Did I choke you? Did you light on fire?' How the hell do you think it makes me feel—"

"How do you think it makes me feel that they're all about you?" he asks, and finally, she can see, she's broken him. He is angry, eyes flashing, cheeks hot.

"Everything mixed up in my head, _everything_ I'm confused about, is about you, Katniss. I can't remember if we got married or if you killed my parents, so forgive me for trying to sort that out!"  
There's a pause, where she's not sure what to shout next, but he picks it up, anger radiating from him now, like heat.

"So, yeah, I'm pushing myself to have 'episodes' while you're still here, because we both know you're not sticking around forever."

And he's gone, not even staying long enough to see that she has a tear on her cheek, that she's already sorry, that she shouldn't have started it. She hears him banging around the living room, and she hopes he's moving the painting. She stays where she is, not turning to face him and admit she was wrong, but not moving for the liquor either, which is her usual escape route.

She wonders if he'll have an episode now, after trying to provoke one and then getting into a screaming match with her. She sinks into a chair in the kitchen, listens as she hears him stomp up the stairs and then around his bedroom for a while. She's still mad at him, but she knows she was wrong, that she's the one who should apologize. He's just trying to survive, same as she is, and he's smart enough to use her for survival while she's still here.

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	8. dandelion

**Thanks so much to all my lovely reviewers! You honestly help me write so much faster! **

**This is my favourite chapter. Hope you enjoy. **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

She hears the weight of his bed creak the ceiling but she still sits stoically in her chair. Just because he's in bed doesn't mean he's going to sleep. But then she hears the soft mutters and moans that mean he's sleeping, not in a full nightmare but not just lying there, having an episode. She pulls the rabbits and squirrel out of her bag and dresses them, leaving them for another day. She's not hungry, but she's not angry anymore. She just feels empty, despite the stuff and the sounds he brings to her house.

She listens again, to be sure he's sleeping, that he's not about to come down at any moment, before she heads over to his studio, because she's going to burn the portrait of Snow. She won't have it in her house and she knows she'll enjoy watching it go up in flames. She pauses as she flicks on the lights to his studio. Though Peeta has no negative associations with it, it's the same room where Snow threatened her before the Tour. She has barely ever set foot in here except to call him to dinner or the couple times his episodes have happened in here. She sees two sets of canvases covered with sheets: one that says Games and one that simply says nothing. It must be under the unlabelled sheet, because Snow was never in their Games, not really. They were his pieces, not the other way around.

She lifts the sheet off, ready to face her worst fear, and instead comes face to face with herself. It's a picture of her, lying on her back, hair fanned out, in their second Games. She remembers this, remembers how he gazed at her while they were kissing and she blushes at the suggestion in his portrait. She pulls it over to look at the next one: she's in her fire dress at her first interview, and she looks so young and untainted. Next one- she's in her uniform from 13, laughing at something over lunch, and she remembers this, remembers that they were talking about Buttercup. It was the first time she'd laughed weeks. She flips again, estimating that there must be at least twenty canvases here. Are these all of her? This is of her at the Reaping, which would seem grim, but she's holding Prim by the shoulders, and anyone can see the love and devotion there. Next one—it's of her in the first Games, sitting in a tree, looking fierce and independent and _so_ strong. She flips, and now, for the first time, she's swept off her feet. Because this is of a young, young Katniss, soaking wet in the rain, staring disbelievingly at two burnt loaves of bread. She lets the other paintings fall to the floor as her fingers trace this one. He's captured it in perfect detail: her cheekbones stick out, her face is pale, her eyes dead, but lit with a spark of disbelief that anyone would actually want to help her. It's the perfect portrait of the event: there's even a patch of dandelions in the background.

What's sweeping her off her feet is not that Peeta's an amazing painter (he always was, wasn't he?) or that that he's captured this life-changing event so vividly (he was there, wasn't he?). It's that she looks so beautiful that her heart might break. He's spun every event to make her look strong, devoted, fierce, desirable, but this is the first one where she feels like it's truly her, staring at the bread. She looks beautiful yet breakable. _How the hell did he do this?_ How did he remember what dress she was wearing, that she used to have a tiny scar above her right eyebrow, before the Capitol took away all her old scars and gave her new ones? How the hell did he make that dandelion look like it was radiating hope in the rain?

She nearly jumps out of her skin when his warm hand touches her arm. In all the time they've known each other, he has never snuck up on her until now. He's looking at her as if he's completely unsure of who he's seeing, as if he's not sure if she's going to shoot him or hit him or what. Her first reaction is worry that he'll be angry she's in here, then shock that he snuck up on her, then…desire. It's as if the tiny fluttering of her heart or warmth in her chest over the last few weeks were a prelude to this: this enormous feeling of warmth and want.

"Is this really how you picture me?" she asks. He looks at the portrait: though she's bedraggled and emaciated, no one would ever deny that she's beautiful.

"I can't seem to get a clear picture of you," he whispers, and then he kisses her.

This is nothing like their other kisses; it's more beautiful, more full of desire, than any kiss during their Tour or even on the beach in their second Games. She wants him, so desperately, needs him to fill this empty space she'd long given up on having filled. And she's never felt his hands like this before: wrapped around her waist, pulling her closer, his mouth gently opening hers. There's stubble on his chin and she decides that she likes the way it's rubbing against her face. She's running her fingers through the hair at the back of his neck, trying so hard not to moan in pleasure because then he might stop, and this kiss is what she's been waiting for.

When they pull apart she starts to say something, but stops. He looks at her, puts a finger under her chin, makes her look into his eyes.

"That would've been a really great first kiss," she whispers, and he grins.

"It's the first one not for the cameras or the audience," he tells her. "It's the first one that's real." She marvels at his ability to always have the perfect thing to say, before she has to go and argue again.

"No, I kissed you right after we escaped the mutts in the Capitol, remember?" she asks, though now that she asks, she's unsure if he does remember since he was so far beyond her reach at the time. "I kissed you, and then I asked you to stay with me, and you said-"

"Always." He does remember.

This time his kiss is less gentle and more demanding; he's pushing her up against the wall, one hand on her waist and one on her lower back, arching her into him. She feels lost in him: his taste, his scent, his hands, the feel of his hair between her fingers. By the time he pulls away for air, her limbs feel fuzzy and her eyes can't seem to focus on anything but him.

"I really like kissing you when we're not under imminent threat of death," she whispers, stupidly. They look at each other for a moment and then sink onto the floor in ridiculous laughter. It's the first time either of them has truly laughed in months, and she decides there's no sound she loves better.

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	9. cupcakes

**Thanks so much to all my lovely reviewers! **

**It took me awhile to edit this one, even though it's shorter—sorry! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

They eat cupcakes for dinner, sneaking into their own kitchen like naughty children about to get caught (by whom, she wonders, their parents' ghosts?). They giggle and fight over cupcakes, smearing frosting on each other's faces. And finally, they talk, really talk, about the good times growing up and even in the Games.

"So, I have to ask: what actually went through your head when I told all of Panem you were pregnant?"

His eyes are alight; he's still delighted about this piece of mischief. She wonders if he wishes it were true. She hasn't had a period in at least a year, maybe two. At first she thought her body was reacting to starvation, then to stress, but with it still gone, she wonders if whoever's in charge simply doesn't want to make any more of her.

He's still looking at her, waiting for her answer.

"Hmm…I believe my exact thought process went: 'What the hell is he talking about? What baby?…Oh. Oh, I get it, I'm pregnant. Well, that's awkward. Is my mother watching this?'"

He's laughing, still has a smear of blue frosting on his cheek from their frosting fight, and she thinks of how incredibly wonderful he is. She's not sure how she ever doubted that he was attractive.

"I was pretty proud of myself for thinking that up with no help from Haymitch," he smirks. He _is_ proud of himself for causing so much trouble. In some ways, he's such a child, still has so many fragments of a little boy in him. Sometimes she still sees her boy with the bread: willing to risk a beating for the girl he had a crush on.

"Yeah, I was so shocked, since we both know _Haymitch_ was responsible for all the trouble you caused during interviews the year before," she tells him sarcastically, rolling her eyes. He chuckles. God, she loves his laugh.

"He helped," Peeta admits, licking the icing from around a yellow cupcake. It's frosted like a sunflower, but she decides it looks more like a dandelion in his hands.

"I mean, he helped with the presentation. You have to admit: we did good."

She rolls her eyes again, wondering why it's so damn hard for her to give him a solid compliment. They had done better than "good" and she should be acknowledging this. All she can remember is her blush, how angry she'd been that he'd made her look weak.

"I was pissed," she confesses. He snorts with laughter.

"Yeah, I kind of noticed when you almost broke my hand." She hears herself laugh. Her laugh is so rare now, and he's made it happen twice in one night.

_How did she ever think she could survive without him? _

She catches herself straight in her tracks, halting her train of thought immediately. She _can_ survive without him. She can survive without anyone. She does not need him, his kisses or his laughter or how much safer she feels with him here. She might like it, but she does _not_ need it.

He notices the change in her demeanor.

"Hey," he whispers, reaching for her hand across the table. She yanks hers away, wary of him now. How the hell did he trick her into thinking she needed him?

"I wasn't mad," he tells her softly, thinking she's still worried about his hand in that first Games. She doesn't have the heart to tell him that this Game is much more serious, feels more fatal.

"I know you weren't," she says, getting up from the table, leaving her cupcake unfinished. Why the hell are they even eating cupcakes? They aren't children, despite their age. They stopped being children a long time ago. Why are they acting like they might find happiness here? They're always going to be haunted, always going to be chased by their nightmares.

"I'm going to sleep," she says, and starts to leave, but his voice stops her.

"Katniss," he says, and his voice isn't soft anymore. "What happened? What—did I do something wrong or say something…?" He's so confused, and there's a part of her that wants to sit on his lap, lick the icing of his cheek, let him make her feel happy again, like she might have a future with some hope in it. But she brushes that away: she does not need him. She can't.

"Nothing happened," she tells him dismissively, a bit caustically. "Cupcakes just make me tired."

It's such a stupid lie that she hopes he calls her on it, tells her she's a bad liar, makes a joke. But he closes off too, nods his head, and lets her go.

She feels like smiling as she walks up the stairs, pulls off her clothes and gets into bed, with no intention of sleeping.

"See?" she wants to tell that small girl inside of her who still wants him, who likes the way he makes her laugh. "He let you go. He doesn't need you either."

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	10. healing

**Lovely people- thank you SO much for your wonderful reviews! You are all so sweet and kind. And the feedback really helps me write! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

The next morning he isn't angry or even upset with her. He is distant, his voice as hollow as it was when he realized she'd been lying during the first Games. She remembers the panic it filled her with then, feels a familiar panic rising now, but she refuses to succumb to it. She does not need him.

He's laid out muffins and buns and cups of coffee on the table. He's clearly been up for a while. She sits, thanking him genuinely, but he just nods, saying nothing. She hates his distance but she knows it's exactly what she wants, exactly what she'd been hoping to achieve when she walked away last night.

"How'd you sleep?" he asks, his voice carefully rid of emotion. She stares at him. Their rooms are right beside each other and she woke herself up at least five times. He must have heard her screaming. He knows exactly how she slept.

"I slept _great_," she tells him as sarcastically as she can, barely refraining from getting some liquor for her coffee. What the hell is wrong with him?

"How did you sleep, Peeta?" she asks, hoping if she says his name with that poisonous anger in her voice enough times he won't light up when she says it anymore. He sighs. She realizes, as she's waiting for him to answer, that she didn't hear him scream last night. Not even once.

"I had an episode," he says, quietly. She stares at him. He almost never has episodes at night and if he does, she wakes up before he has them. Maybe she has a sense about it, or maybe it's that he's so damn loud walking around, or maybe they are just tied together too tightly, but whatever it is, she can see in his eyes it's the first one he's had without her in at least a month.

"You had one last night? While I was sleeping?" He shrugs, nods his head.

"I think you were sleeping," he tells her. "I could hear you screaming, I think you were having a nightmare but maybe it wasn't real. I don't know."

She's upset, hurt that he didn't come to her afterwards, but why the hell would he after how she treated him? She's ashamed, humiliated by how awful she was. Why couldn't she let him down gently, just this once? Why does she keep doing this to him?

"I didn't tell you so you'd feel guilty, so you can wipe that look off your face," he tells her. "I told you because I need your help."

She nods. He needs her to pull him out of them. Except…he doesn't, because he's here, perfectly coherent, even made breakfast, so that's not it. What does he need her help with?

He puts his hand on the table and she gasps. His hand and half his forearm are covered in blood and there's a huge piece of glass sticking out of his palm. How the hell did he make coffee like this? With one hand, the whole time? God, he must really love her.

"What did you do?" she demands, not touching him yet. He sighs.

"I think I put my fist through a window. I don't know. I don't remember." He's upset, she can see, probably more from the not remembering than the pain itself.

"You can take it out, right?" he asks, looking at her evenly. He's willing her not to freak out, to keep it together. She, again, has the feeling that he's the stronger one, before she pulls herself together.

"Of course," she assures him. "Hang on."

She grabs bandages and alcohol to clean the cut with and sits at the table, taking his hand in hers. The last time they held hands was when he painted Annie and Finnick, and she remembers feeling so attracted to him then. Now she's fighting back sobs, because holding hands like this is not what she wants, his hand bloodied, her hand shaking. She should've been there. She's the one who made this happen.

"I'm sorry about the window," he tells her, and she shakes her head.

"It doesn't matter," she assures him. "Take a deep breath." He gasps as she pulls the glass out and the cut starts to bleed even more. It's deep, goes at least halfway through his hand, maybe more.

"How the hell did this happen?" she wonders aloud. "It looks like someone shoved it in there." He sighs, pained.

"I think I did," he admits. "I mean, how else would it get in there? I think…I think I was remembering something awful, and…I don't know. But it brought me out of it. I remember everything after that."

She stares at him, shocked, disturbed by how unbearable this is. How much more pain could he possibly need to be in? She hates herself in this moment; because she wasn't there for him, because she set him off, upset him more than his painting of Snow. And he had to stab himself to regain sanity because she can't seem to protect him, can't ever seem to clean up the messes she makes. _She_ brought up the interview and smashing his hand in the urn last night. This is her fault. The least she could do if she's going to set him off is take care of him afterwards. She should've been there, to let him ask questions, touch her, breathe her in…

"Wait a minute," she says aloud, staring at him, trying to get a clear picture. "So, you're suggesting that the only things that bring you out of your episodes are extreme pain…and me?"

He rolls his eyes at her, and for a second she feels shameful at how selfish she is. This is about him, not her. But then she shrugs it away. Selfishness is vital to surviving alone.

"That's what you're saying, isn't it?" she demands, holding the cloth to the gaping hole in his hand."You're having them while I'm still here because if it's a toss-up between getting stabbed in the hand and—oh, shit," she mutters, as she realizes how fast he's bleeding. She's going to have to stitch him up, there's nothing else for it.

"Hang on," she tells him, getting the needle and thread her mother left here. She isn't sure she's sane enough or stable enough to do this, but she is sure that she has no choice. He looks at her, wincing already, and takes a shot of the liquor. She can't say she blames him.

"I need to clean this," she tells him, dabbing some liquor on a cloth.

"Talk?" he asks; it comes out as begging. "Tell me a story." She glares at him.

"How about you answer my questions?" she demands, but he cries out in pain when she begins cleaning the cut, so he's clearly not in any shape to talk. He's shaking when she's finished and has gulped a lot of liquor, considering it can't even be noon yet. She raises her eyebrows at him disapprovingly, aware she's being a bitch, but unable to stop. She is devastated by what he won't say: that she is the embodiment of his worst pain.

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	11. not children

**Oh my word. I'm so flattered and humbled by your amazing reviews that I don't even know what to do. Thank you! They make me so happy (and also help me write!) **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

Peeta starts smiling again as she's stitching him up, either because it hurts less than the disinfecting or because he's now been through half the bottle on his own. He gives her a sloppy smile that confirms the latter.

"You're pretty," he tells her, slurring, and she almost smiles. She catches herself though: she's mad at him, even though she has no right to be.

"How about you answer my question?" she demands, again, but more gently this time. She doesn't know what she's doing and she feels her inexperience shows.

"Could we just not talk about this?" he begs, but his sincerity is made slightly less convincing by how drunk he is. "I wanna talk about…the goat."

She rolls her eyes. He looks at his hand, concentrating hard.

"You sure you know what you're doing there?" he slurs, and she blushes. She was hoping he was too drunk to notice her sloppy stitches and how badly her hands are shaking.

"'Course I do," she bluffs and he laughs, loudly, tipping back the bottle and gulping more.

"You're such a bad liar," he giggles. "You have the weird, squeamish look on your face that you did in the first Games."

He proceeds to giggle like a small girl and tip back more liquor, and if she weren't working so hard on fixing his hand she'd be on the floor laughing at how ridiculous he looks. But she is working hard on his hand, and though it takes far too long (her inexperience giving Peeta time to finish the bottle), when she's done it's stopped bleeding and is clean enough that she's not worried about infection. She sits back in her chair, wondering if she should make fresh coffee or heat up the coffee he made on their stove. He is still giggling; of course Peeta would be a happy drunk.

"You're going to throw up," she warns him, which just sets him off again.

"We should eat cupcakes!" he tells her, wide-eyed with excitement. "I never got to have treats for breakfast when I was a kid." He gets up, stumbling around, and she pushes him back to his chair, afraid for his stitches, and gets him a cupcake.

"You're still a kid," she tells him as he focuses on getting it into his mouth.

"Only in age," he tells her. "After what we've been through, no one could consider us children. Our childhoods are over." She's marveling at his way with words, even in this state, when he starts giggling again.

"If you think about it, though, we _are_ children. We could still be in the Reaping!" He giggles, though she has no idea how that could ever be funny.

He's right: by the Capitol's standards, they are still children. She's sure Snow would still see them that way. He always saw her that way; she could see it in his eyes when she'd gone in to get the rose before his execution. It was only when she was with Peeta that he'd stopped seeing her as a scared little girl. That was what the Capitol had hoped for when they hijacked him, she now knows: their separation turned them into children, took away the strength they'd gained making it through two Games. Together, they are a dangerous enemy, with Peeta's charismatic way with words and Katniss' haphazard ability to stir others into action. Separated, they are frightened children, unable to stir the slightest thing into action. It's their togetherness that makes them strong enough to be a threat.

"We're not children," she tells him, firmly. He looks at her.

"Didn' you just say we were?" he asks, turning his head sideways to peer at her. "Whoa…the room is spinning!" He giggles, tries to get to his feet, sways, and falls back into his chair. She sighs; this wasn't what she'd hoped her day would be like. She pulls him up off the chair, propping him up on her shoulder because it's certain he can't walk in a straight line, and manages to get him up the stairs and into his bed. She finds a bucket in the kitchen and brings it to him, hopes he'll be better at cleaning up after himself than Haymitch. He's still giggling at her, even as she gets a cloth to clean the blood from his hand and forearm.

"You're a very different drunk than Haymitch," she tells him. His smile is so bright, it seems to radiate from him. He lights up the whole room. He looks like a different person when he smiles.

"I'm a diff…diff…hmmm…" He's completely lost to the world, she sees this, so she does something dangerous, something she shouldn't be doing on the heels of last night. She slips into bed with him, combing his hair back from his face. He smiles at her, and she feels his radiance brighten her, warm her from the inside out.

"Peeta," she whispers, wanting to tell him to be careful with his stitches, but he groans, and not in pain.

"I love it when you say my name," he whispers, and his hands find her body under the covers: one hand on her waist, the other on her thigh. "It sounds so perfect when you say it, like it's _my_ name, like it belongs to you. I belong…" he trails off, slumping onto her shoulder, but still with that happy smile on his face.

"I love your smile," she whispers, in response to his little tirade. She's pretty sure he can't hear her, but she wants to be sure.

"I love when you smile because of me." She settles him on his pillows, then, hesitantly, lies down beside him.

She remembers this so clearly: his arms around her, her head on his chest, listening to his heart. They're a perfect fit. Never did Gale's arms feel like this. She knows that she and Peeta are a team, an unstoppable team that scares the hell out of anyone who tries to go up against them. As long as they're together, she reminds herself. Together, they can withstand torture, betrayal, fire…Separated, they turn back into those trembling children who were certain to die in the Games.

She's tired, barely slept last night, and she feels herself slipping away. She looks up at his face, puts one hand on his cheek. He's breathtaking. And since it has nothing to do with survival or need, and since he's not going to remember this anyways, she tells him, "Peeta, I love you."

**Reviews make me smile. **


	12. an inferno

**Oh my word. I don't even know what to say other than- THANK YOU! All those reviews and favorite-ing make me feel so blown away and so humbled. You guys are amazing. You not only made me smile, but giggle like a little girl. Teehee. Thank you! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

She wakes up to the feel of Peeta's fingers in her hair and the sun setting through the windows. She stares at him, groggy, feeling something unfamiliar she can't name. He's grinning at her and she realizes that he's sober.

"How long was I out?" she asks, sitting up, but not getting out of his bed. She feels so comfortable here, can't make herself move even though she knows this is stupid.

"Awhile…seven hours? Eight?"

That's when she realizes this unfamiliar thing is that she feels rested. When was the last time she slept for eight hours?

"You sobered up, then, Haymitch?" she asks him, but she isn't angry with him anymore. She hasn't felt this well, this whole, in weeks, maybe months. He's grinning.

"I threw up four times," he tells her, laughing. "I'm so glad it didn't wake you up. You were really out."

He raises his eyebrows. He's looking for a response from her because he knows she never sleeps. He is probably more aware than her of what a big deal this is, and he wants some confirmation that he did the right thing, letting her sleep until sunset.

"No nightmares," she confirms, and he grins.

"That's a first, isn't it?" he asks. "Since I've lived here?"

"Yeah, I guess so," she mutters, looking down, angry again at her inability to be kind to him. But if she's kind to him, she's leading him on. And she doesn't need him.

He sees this, this change in her demeanor from cautious joy to cold distance. He sighs.

"Hungry?" he asks and she nods. They get out of bed and she tries so, so hard, not to think about how much better it is sleeping in his arms than sleeping on her own. She can't handle the nightmares, not without him, but she could never tell him that. She doesn't know why she's so damn proud. That doesn't mean she needs him, just that she likes having him there. That she loves him.

She thinks of her dangerous confession, and though she's sure he didn't hear it, sure he has no idea what she said to him before falling asleep in his arms, she feels like things might be different. She loves him. She loves him? When the hell did everything get so confusing?

He's looking at his hand as they descend the stairs. She blushes, trying to pull some of that pride back up, but it is gone as he looks at her clumsy stitches. Why couldn't she have had a bit of her mother's blood?

"You did a good job," he tells her, smiling. "This doesn't look half as bad as I thought it did." She laughs, then, at his confession that he thought she'd done a terrible job.

"I didn't do a good job, I did a barely competent job," she tells him. She feels a genuine smile on her face. He's the only one who can make her smile.

"But thanks for the vote of confidence." He laughs. Is she the only one who can make him laugh?

"It looked worse drunk," he confesses. He pauses. "Katniss, will you make supper?"

His voice is hesitant, and she looks at him, confused. Of course she'll make supper: his hand is a mess, her haphazard stitches sure to catch on everything. She nods, though, saying nothing, and he heads to his studio.

He isn't gone long; she has heated up some rabbit soup on the stove, sliced bread, and is pouring milk when he comes into the kitchen, sits in his chair, and shoves a piece of paper across to her placemat. She places the milk on their placemats before she picks it up and unfolds it.

She gasps. It's a picture of his nightmare. She feels her nose prickle, and the tears begin before she's even fully taken it in. She tries desperately to cling to some negative emotion: resentment that he has an outlet and she doesn't (as if it's his fault he's well-adjusted and she's not) or jealousy at his talent (this took him less than ten minutes) or anger that he's pushing this on her (but honestly, all he's doing is answering her question). She can summon absolutely nothing but shame. The sketch, so beautiful, coming alive on the page as his pictures always do, is of her cutting into his hand, engraving it with the same attention and care he gives his paintings. She has a knife—"Clove's?" she inquires, looking at him across the table, and he nods. She's cutting into his hand, looking straight at him, carving him and drawing his blood without flinching. The worst part is that he is not fighting back, trying to get away, or even looking pained. He's staring at her, looking into her eyes, and she can't tell if he's expressionless or in love, because all of his expressions show how in love with her he is. There's a close-up of his hand, beside this disturbing image, and she can see that in his nightmare, she was carving a flame into his skin, the blood pouring from it like billowing smoke. It's beautiful, intricate, perfect. _Girl on fire_. Lighting everything on fire that she comes into contact with, and not in the way his smile lights up a room. In the way the fire burned her, burned him, killed Prim…she is destructive, an inferno. Is she destroying him?

She's sobbing, hasn't even realized it until her tears spill onto his beautiful picture. Then, she's crumpled, setting the picture down because it's so beautiful, she can't destroy it. _She destroys everything_. She would've fallen onto the ground if he hadn't caught her, pulled her into his lap. She sobs into him, wanting to pull away because she's _destroying_ him, but she can't. She can't let go.

"I'm sorry," he whispers, rubbing her back, his lips on her hair. "I'm so sorry, but you asked. You asked, and I didn't want you to think—"

She's crying too hard to let him finish, so he just holds her until she's calmed down. She's thinking of Prim and the fire, thinking of how much she has burned, how relentless her destruction is.

"You asked," he whispers, picking up where he left off as if she hadn't just been breaking down in his arms, "and I didn't want you to be confused. Yes, my episodes and nightmares are all about you. Snow made sure of that. But, Katniss, having you wake me from the shiny nightmares, the confusing hell of my episodes, is _nothing_ like how I woke from this one. I needed to know if the pain was real or not real, if you really cut me like that, if you really…" He trails off with a sigh, pausing to push her hair back from her tearstained face.

"If I really what?" she asks. This time his sigh is softer.

"If you…if you're really the girl from my nightmares. When you're there, I just have to ask, and once I see you're there, I know you would _never _hurt me. I know you hurting me is not real: I don't need real pain to confirm it. When you're there, I feel like a person again, like I'm whole. You make me trust that I'm…well, real."

She's still sobbing, at his beautiful way with words, at how _complete_ he makes her feel, like she's important, like she's needed. But she _would_ hurt him, she did, she still is. Is she destroying him? No, _no_, because she's the one who pulls him out of his episodes whenever he pushes himself over the edge of his sanity…

"You have to stop," she whimpers, pulling herself closer to him. "Please, please stop. You're pushing yourself, you're begging the ghosts to come back, you're _making_ yourself have episodes and I can't—I can't—"

She can't get anymore out; she can't get past all the unsaid things, even though she knows it's the unspoken words that really matter.

"I'll stop," he promises, holding her as tight as he can. "I'll stop pushing myself, I promise. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry—"

"No, I'm the one who should be sorry!" she bursts out, still not in control. "You- you were pushing yourself because you thought I'd leave. It's my fault! I…I made you think I'd leave. I made you think I didn't love you enough to stay. I'm not going anywhere. I promise."

That's all she can manage. She can't tell him she needs him, _she can't need him_, but she can offer him these words as she shudders into him, sobbing into his shoulder, knowing that he needs so much more from her than she could ever give, hoping that she is not truly the girl in his nightmares.

**Reviews make me grin. **


	13. lying

**As always, a huge thank you for all the reviews and adding this to your favorites list. I'm so incredibly honoured by your feedback—it brings a giant smile to my face! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

When she pulls herself together he eats, but she does not. She won't get off him, is scared if she lets him go for an instant he'll run to his studio and paint another goddamn picture of Snow (or of her, which would be worse). Why the hell doesn't she trust any of his promises? He's the trustworthy one. Instead, she sits on his lap as he eats her dinner, offering her bites again and again, complimenting her soup.

"This is my favorite," he offers, smiling. "It reminds me of our cave." She snorts.

"Yeah, we sure had some good times there," she mutters sarcastically. He shakes his head at her.

"We _did _have some good times there," he tells her, as if he's reminding her. She remembers.

"Our first kiss…you know, the one where you faked having feelings for me?"

"I felt something," she tells him, desperate to make herself sound better than she is. She's determined to be better than the girl in his nightmares, to be a radiant, glowing presence in his life, not the destructive inferno that she seems to turn into with so little effort.

"I felt something that time you kissed me right before my head started bleeding…when…" but she's trailing off because she's remembering how desperate she felt, that hunger for him. She remembers that first real kiss, how badly she did not want to lose the boy with the bread. She knew then that her survival in the arena would mean nothing if she lost him. She stops herself there, sure that if she lets her thoughts continue, she'll have to face the fact that her survival will still mean nothing if she loses him.

"When what?" he whispers, his soup forgotten.

"Nothing," she whispers, but it's such a weak defense. Why is she always hiding from him?

"It's always amazed me what a terrible liar you are," he says conversationally. He dips his bread in the soup. "I mean, you're such a radiant, compelling, lethal person, but when you open your mouth to lie—"

"I can lie!" she protests, her face going red as she realizes she hasn't succeeded in lying to him in an awful long time. He smirks at her.

"Give an example," he requests, digging into his soup again as though he knows he'll be waiting awhile for her answer. She stutters over it, trying to think of a _good_ example, one that won't push him over the edge or break this tenuous hold she seems to be keeping on her sanity. He smiles as he eats, and she realizes, without meaning to, that he gave her an out, that he's keeping up this light conversation so that she doesn't have to revisit the cave or the Games or her own broken promises if she doesn't want to. She runs a hand down the back of his neck, grateful.

"I drugged you with sleeping syrup by telling you about _sugar berries_," she reminds him, and he bursts out laughing through his mouthful of soup, barely manages to swallow.

"Sugar berries," he laughs, and she grins. "I'd completely forgotten about that."  
"And then after you were out, I whispered, 'Who can't lie, Peeta?'" she tells him, looking at him from under her eyelashes for dramatic effect. He laughs again.

"Bet Haymitch loved that."

"Oh, it's a safe bet that everything I did in the arenas pissed Haymitch off, but he had to let me live," she says carelessly, as if none of this matters anymore. As if it isn't what keeps her up at night.

"He needed someone to feed him if he ever made it home," agrees Peeta, finishing off his supper. He looks questioningly across the table at her untouched meal. She shrugs.

"I think I'm going back to bed," he tells her, and it's not a request for her to get off him, merely a reminder that he's hung over, drank an entire bottle today, barely slept because he was throwing up, but she jumps off of his lap as if he's on fire. He kisses her cheek, softly, thanking her for the meal, and then ascends the stairs, leaving her alone in the kitchen.

She wonders if he's hoping she'll eat if he leaves her alone. He's such an idiot, because all she does is clean up, make coffee, and sit in a chair listening to the floor of his bedroom creak above her head. The entire time he's gone she's worrying about him: his nightmares, his stitches, his episodes. She doesn't want him to have another episode, especially not alone, in bed, at night. He'd come get her, wouldn't he? She wasn't awful today. But what if he can't come get her? What if he's all alone, trapped in his confused world of memories, real and not real, Games and not Games, violent and…

She's halfway up the stairs before she realizes what she's doing, but once she's come to herself she doesn't stop. She's quiet as she enters his bedroom, completely convinced he'll be mid-episode and about to slit his own throat. But he's not mid-episode; he's sitting up with the lamp on, sketching something. He looks up as his door opens, not in fear, just in curiosity.

"Do you need something?" he asks politely, after she stands there, frozen, not entering the room but not leaving him alone either. She crosses to him, puts her mug of coffee on an end table, and wordlessly climbs into his bed. She snuggles into him as he puts the sketchpad away, but he's not quick enough for her to miss that he's sketching her, sitting on his lap and laughing as she had been less than an hour ago.

"You can't have an episode alone again," she tells him, simply. "I won't allow it. And someone needs to be here to watch that you don't pull out your stitches accidentally. And…"

She's out of reasons, but one look at his face tells her she didn't need any in the first place, that he isn't interested in rationalizations, he's only interested in her. He nods consent, turning out the light. Things are awkward, for a few moments: she sits up to get her coffee, but he slides down, his hands seeking her waist, her elbows, his hands pulling up the blankets, and so on. But then they lay there, his head on her chest, arms around her, and she sips coffee and plays with his hair as he falls asleep.

**Reviews make me smile. **


	14. better when he's there

**As always, a huge thank you for all the reviews and adding this to your favorites list. You guys make my smile so big! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

She can't remember falling asleep but she must've, sometime after she set her coffee down and snuggled into him. She had a nightmare about Cinna, but not a bad one, not one where she woke up screaming. She can't remember the details, just knows that she is shivering despite Peeta's heat. Peeta. She lies in the dark, guessing that dawn is maybe half an hour away, and sinks into his warmth, his comfort. _This _is what she's been craving, lying in bed alone, wondering if she loves him, finally concluding that she does. This is exactly what she needs. No, not needs (she does not need him) but wants, desires. She looks at his hands on her body, has never noticed before how big they are, compared to her tiny frame. She sets her head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat. She wants to kiss him, but he's sleeping off the damage of yesterday, between his hand and the alcohol and her constant destruction.

When she rolls over again, after falling into a groggy half-sleep, he's awake, playing with her hair. She smiles at him, trying so hard not to give in to the contentment, the utter joy inside of her. She cannot need him.

"No nightmares?" he asks, combing through her hair. Of course not, she thinks, not with you here. But she can't tell him that; can't tell him he's the only thing that makes her nights bearable. He's probably the only thing that's making her life bearable. She can't tell him that, can she? Can't make him think she might need him…  
She realizes he's still waiting for her answer.

"I had nightmares, but not too bad. They're…they're better when you're here." There, that's all she can offer him: a cowardly portion of the truth, but it's something. His lips are moving on the back of her neck, his body wrapped around hers, and she wants him. She can't want him this bad. It feels like a hunger, the hunger she felt on the beach in the second Games, a hunger of an entirely different kind. She may bean expert on hunger, but she has no idea what to do with this.

"I should go hunt," she tells him and he nods, but doesn't let go. He rolls her onto her back, hovering on top of her, and kisses her, trailing his lips down her neck onto her collarbone.

"Can you bring back a wild turkey?" he asks in between kisses, either oblivious to the way she's clinging to him, gasping in pleasure or ignoring her as some kind of tactic.

"I want to try to make a pot pie my father made, and I think turkey would work well." His teeth find her collarbone, and she makes a sound she's never heard herself make before.

"Oh God…Peeta, what are you doing?" He looks at her in surprise.

"Kissing you. Then I'll paint. Then, when you get home, I'm going to make pot pie with turkey, which may not work as well as my—"

"_No_," she hisses, angry that he took it so literally, trying not to arch into him as his hands stroke her hips, so perfectly. She has no idea how he makes her feel this way, and though she likes it, she doesn't want to give in to it. She needs to cling to some semblance of her independence, of how capable she would've been at winning the Games without him.

"What are you doing, here, in bed with me, in District 12?"

He gives her a perplexed look.

"Would you rather if I were in bed with you in District 2? 4? 13?"

She groans, rolling her eyes, and starts to pull away from him, but he draws her back, placing kisses on her neck and even her ears as he whispers, "I'm kidding. You're asking me what I'm doing with you, yes?" She nods, loving the feel of his teeth on her earlobe.

"I'm with you because I have no idea what I'd do without you."

She sighs into him, relaxing into his arms, even letting him kiss her, before the full weight of his words takes effect. He feels her pull away, is ever so aware of the constant fluctuations in her mood, this game of push and pull that they play.

"You've paid off all your debts to me," she tells him, trying so hard to make it sound like it's not about love or need. "You've paid them off in full and then some." He shakes his head at her.

"That's not why I'm here," he whispers. "I'm here because I don't know what I'd do without you. You're my whole life, remember?" He smiles at her, tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.

"I'm sorry," he says, sincerely. "We just started sleeping in the same bed again, I probably don't need to be kissing you like that yet, do I?"

She smiles at his genuineness; he doesn't hide anything. It's she who's hidden so much, all this time, who is still hiding how she feels and what she's fighting against.

"I…I like it," she tells him, choosing her words carefully. "I just…"

She's cut off by him swinging his legs out of the bed, not in an angry way, but he puts a stop to her speech nonetheless.

"You hunt, I'll paint, and we can talk later. Or not," he amends, seeing the look on her face. "We don't have to talk about it. I don't mind if you keep pulling away, as long as you always come back." He kisses her forehead before he heads downstairs to paint in his pajamas.

She's disoriented, heading to her room to pull on clothes, and she finds herself stuffing the wrong foot in her boot in a daze. He was kissing her, and not just kissing her but touching her, making her feel completely loved. His lips make her tingle, all over, and his hands are so incredible, so warm and so _big_. She always forgets the steadiness he brings to everything, how much safer everything feels when he's around. He's probably the reason she's regaining her sanity, she realizes, and though she doesn't like this thought, once it's there, there's no displacing it. It's absolutely true. Her world was spinning, completely out of control, everything on fire, burned to ash. He brings a cool, steadying force to everything, makes her feel like the spinning will stop and that maybe something good could come out of the ashes.

She sees movement in the distance and gets excited—the supply train is even bigger than usual, which is great, because she'd hoped someone was going to bring them gardening tools now that summer's in full bloom. She needs more than her hands and the big shovel to give the primrose bushes due diligence.

But as she's heading towards the train, shielding her eyes and wondering if she can still go to the woods, leave the supplies to Peeta and Haymitch, she starts screaming. And then she's bolted back into the house, screaming the name of the only person who can still save her.

**I'm sorry for the cliffy! It just had to be done. I'll update soon, promise! **


	15. they're real

**I'm sorry for the cliffy, really I am! It just worked out that way.**

**Thanks for all your reviews! **

**Alyx in particular: thank you for the feedback! It's actually very helpful for me to know if things are going too fast or slow. Though I will say…17-year-old boys are 17-year-old boys. Even Peeta, much as I hate to admit it. :P **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

His arms are around her in a second, one strong arm around her waist, the other around her back. She's never felt safer anywhere else and she's comforted by his heartbeat, thudding its steady beat right below her ear.

"What is it? What's wrong?" he demands. She hasn't gone for her bow, so she's certain he'll know their lives aren't in any immediate danger, but then again, who's to say they're not? She feels his urgency in the way his heartbeat speeds up, but she knows she doesn't have to answer. He'll see through the windows.

"What—there's people!" he exclaims, and she can tell he wants to run to investigate, but it goes against everything in him to let go of her. But she feels this, his desire to check, and so she holds on tighter, hoping that he won't let go, because she's pretty sure he's the only thing holding her together; that if he lets go, she will disintegrate completely, shatter into tiny pieces and blow away with the wind.

_Why the hell are there people here? Who are they? And…what can they possibly want? _

"We can just go see what they want…" he whispers, and he's not pushing her out of his arms, just hoping she'll rejoin the living. He wants to be among the living, not here with the ghosts and this burned-out shell of who she used to be. And then, out of nowhere, she's sobbing, because she doesn't deserve him, never deserved him, could live a _hundred_ _lifetimes_ and not deserve him, and she's terrified that whoever this is, whether from the Capitol or 13, they'll see how burned out she is, how much she's lost her grip on reality, and they'll take him from her. They can't take him. He's the only thing holding her together, the only thing, and she needs…she needs—

"Katniss, we don't have to," he whispers, pulling her close, kissing her hair, her forehead. He plays so many different roles with her: her lover, comforter, best friend—

"You want them," she tries to say, but she's sobbing too hard. She finds a grip on her words, somehow, splutters out, "You'll want them, because they're not ghosts, they'll sleep and talk and listen…they're, they're _real_, and they've never been lit on fire—"  
He cuts her off with a kiss, capturing her words in his mouth, giving her hope. She tastes salt, realizes that she's still crying, and she clings to him harder, hoping that it doesn't have to end. He pulls away, finally, cups her cheek.

"I will never want anyone more than you," he breathes. He wants her, but is it enough?

"They know that this is exactly where I'd come crawling back to," she tells him, knowing there is fear in her eyes and having no idea how to get rid of it, "they know if I'd ever come crawling back anywhere, it's here, and they know that taking you is the best way to hurt me."

"I won't let them take me," he tells her, but as he's kissing her, she thinks that they do take him, every time he has an episode. That separation: Peeta, lost and absent above her, Katniss underneath him, knowing she can't need him but knowing she couldn't live without him, that's what they wanted along. They want to turn them back into the trembling children who should've died in the first Games. She's thought, so many times in between then and now, that they would be better dead. And now, just when she's beginning to see light, to think she was wrong, she knows one thing more certainly than anything else: dying would be infinitely less painful than losing him.

She's kissing him more desperately, foolishly thinking that no one will take him while his lips are on hers, so she's surprised when they are interrupted by an impatient knock at their door.

"If you two could get your tongues _out_ of each other's throats for five minutes," snaps Haymitch, standing at their door, which is still flung open, "we have company, and I hate company."

She giggles at the sight of him: his shirt is rumpled, untucked, and buttoned wrong. Somewhere, she finds the strength to pull away from Peeta and go to Haymitch, button his shirt properly. He grins at her.

"Thanks, sweetheart," he tells her sarcastically.

"Can we go tell them to get the hell out?" she asks eagerly, and he barks a laugh, throwing an arm around her shoulders.

Their guests have half-assembled on their lawn, clearly seeing that some sort of commotion is taking place (though Katniss doesn't give herself any credit for this; she's sure Haymitch made quite a commotion crossing from his house to theirs). She's shocked by how many of this crowd she recognizes: Greasy Sae, Thom, Delly…

"What the hell are you all doing here?" demands Haymitch, and Katniss is desperately glad that his knife is in his pocket. She has her bow, but it's not raised, just hanging limply by her side. She's known since the moment she saw them that they don't pose any physical threat to her: just emotional, just…they can't take him from her, they can't.

"Hi!" squeals Delly. Katniss squeezes Peeta's hand, hard, so Haymitch gets the first word in.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he demands bluntly.

Delly flounders slightly. "The Capitol…well, Paylor, she said…" She's trying to use her optimism to sway them, but she can see the expressions on Haymitch and Katniss' faces, so Greasy Sae takes over.

"This is our home," she says simply, "and it's going to be District 12 again."

"Hell no, it's not," Haymitch snaps at her, but Peeta is grinning.

"You want to help us, clean up and…"

"We'll make it our home," says Delly. "We want to start again."  
Peeta hugs her without warning, so she squeals as she goes into his arms. Katniss stares at them, this blonde girl in his arms, and stalks away before she can greet anyone. Haymitch is two steps behind her.

**So, I recognize that my timing is off, and SC already had Thom and Greasy Sae there at the end of Mockingjay. But...I didn't. And I'm changing it up. So bear with me? Thanks!**

**Reviews make me smile! **


	16. an episode

**Thanks for all your reviews! I'm really appreciating the feedback—it's so helpful to know your thoughts as I'm editing. Please keep it coming? **

**So, she'll touch on it in this chapter, but I won't really get detailed until a few later: why they've been alone so long, what's going on with changes in 12, etc. I'd love to hear your thoughts so I have a better idea of how to elaborate and what to elaborate on. **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

They're halfway through some stew Katniss made for him before they speak. She refused to get him any bread, because bread makes her think of Peeta and she can't think about him. She can't need him. But she does need him: she has no idea what's going on, her need to understand threatening to outweigh her need for solitude. They've been alone, the three of them for…what, a month? Two? They forego clocks and calendars, so she can't be sure, but she knows it has been a long enough time for her to regain some sanity, for Peeta to increase and then decrease his number of episodes. She'd been under the impression this was merely a more liberal, comfortable prison for her, the girl who killed the wrong president. An unconventional hospital for the deranged star-crossed lovers and their drunk mentor. But…if people are going to live here, does that mean she has to start living? Not just surviving, but truly living?

She sits and holds a spoon, staring at her stew blankly as Haymitch gulps through two bowls. He lets her sit in confused silence awhile before he speaks.

"You more upset that they're here or about him?" he asks conversationally. She almost chokes.

"What the hell do you mean, 'about him'?" she demands. She's furious, her face heating up, sure that everyone can see how much she loves him, how terrified she is of losing him.

Haymitch shrugs. At least he has enough shame not to laugh at her.

"You're the Mockingjay," he tells her (unnecessarily: she's thought of nothing else since they arrived. Except Peeta leaving her). "And…he loves you, but you keep playing games with him. Anyone can see—"

He stops there, looking at her with guilt. She does not need him to finish: anyone can see that Delly would be better with Peeta, that anyone would be better with Peeta, really.

"You never got married, so what would you know?" she demands, trying to hurt him.

"Never got married because I knew too much," he mutters.

She sighs, drops the pretense that she's not afraid, that she's not hurting.

"Did you—"

"I couldn't bring anyone else down with me," he says, simply. He gives her time, lets her broken, scattered mind work its' way around his statement before he speaks again. She's grateful, because without Peeta to ground her, keep her solid, her thoughts seem to disappear, like leaves in the wind, and reappear in the strangest places.

"Snow killed her anyways. But I didn't fight hard enough. I didn't love her like you two love each other," Haymitch tells her, looking at her. She looks into his Seam eyes, eyes that make her feel less alone. He's her family, she realizes. Once Peeta leaves her, he'll be all she has left.

"I've never seen anyone love the way he loves you," he tells her, finishing off his stew. "I'd fight for him, sweetheart."

It sounds like a platitude, some meaningless statement from a washed-up drunk, but she knows that right now, he is as sincere as they come. But she can't fight for him: she doesn't remember how to fight, is completely done fighting, has done enough fighting for a lifetime. Besides, if he decides he doesn't want her, what the hell can she do about it?

"Katniss!" The cry comes from across the lawn, and they see Delly, sprinting towards them, towing a boy that Katniss doesn't know.

"We—we need you!" she exclaims, coming up the porch steps. Katniss has never seen her move so quickly.  
"Peeta was helping us move, and there's—there's something wrong with him!" she tells her.

Her feet are moving before she consciously puts the thought together that he's having an episode, that he will hurt himself, and soon, all alone in an unfamiliar house. She hears Haymitch quick on her heels, barking orders at Delly and the boy. Katniss tears through the door of the house they came from, wanting to scream his name, or just to scream, knowing she has to stay silent if she's to hear him. She hears Haymitch, turns to tell him to stay quiet, and that's when she sees Peeta, curled up in the living room, his fist in his mouth. She sees what set him off as she heads toward him: a large carriage clock, beautiful really, but it's decorated with pearls.

She wants to get lost in her own memories of the arena, is worried that with how fragile she is, she won't be able to sort through the memories for him. But before that thought becomes coherent, she's already touched his shoulder and she's underneath him, faster than usual, so fast she barely feels it. He's choking, she realizes, gasping and choking and barely able to breathe. She puts her hands on his cheeks, forcing him to look at her. She has no idea what he's thinking, so she doesn't tell him real or not real. Instead, she begs, her plea simple: "Come back to me, please come back to me, please come back to me, Peeta, please…" He shudders, and then his hand is on hers, on his face, and she sees that he knows she's there. He's stopped looking through her, is looking at her. No one sees her the way he does.

"There is no District 12, real or not real?"

"Not real—we are there now, but it did get mostly destroyed in bombing."

"Rebel bombing—the rebels tried to kill us."

"Not real—the Capitol bombed District 12, they tried to kill us—"

"They killed my family?" He is so confused, and she moans, in agony for him.

"No, no that's not right, _you _killed my family—"

"_Not _real—the Capitol killed your family, in the bombing."

"You tried to kill me."

"Not real."

"And Delly saved me." That's a knife in her heart, but she bears it.

"No, Peeta, I never tried to kill you, and Delly did not save you."

"No..." he agrees, "No, you didn't try to kill me—I tried to kill you."

"Real," she says, sighing, as his finger comes to trace her throat. She thinks, briefly, of his lips on her neck this morning.

"I tried to choke you."

"Real."

"I kissed you this morning."

She smiles. "Real."

"You love me." This one is whispered, and she can see that this is the breaking point: if she's honest, he will come back to her. She isn't sure she can do this, with Haymitch watching, with Delly hovering nearby—

"You love me," he repeats. "Real or not real?"

"Real," she gasps, and he collapses, holding onto her for dear life, breathing in her scent. This time, she is the one crying. "Real," she whispers. "Real. Real. Real."

**Reviews make me smile. **


	17. their mentor

**Thanks for all your reviews! You guys make me simultaneously feel so flattered and so very, very humbled. You guys are unbelievably lovely. **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

Haymitch hauls them to the kitchen table after he's called Delly and the boy, Dalton, back in. She can hear them moving around in the living room and gets up, without a word to Haymitch, and hisses at Delly, "Put that damn clock away. What the hell were you thinking?" Delly is ashen, upset, and she nods consent.

"I…I forgot," she stutters, and Katniss glares at her until she looks away.

"That must be a nice luxury," she snaps, "being able to forget."

Then she rejoins Haymitch and Peeta at the table.

In some small part of her brain, she knows this isn't Delly's fault, that she probably forgets the clock in their second arena, has more important things on her mind than Peeta's pearl. But she's furious that Delly's even _here_, that these people are going to live in Victor's Village, that her time with Peeta is ending. Because he'll choose someone else, she's sure of it.

Haymitch is in full-on mentoring mode, and she can tell he's beyond pissed that he didn't know about this. He likes Peeta better, never tried to deny it, and he's mad that she's been handling this without any help. She raises her chin (the memory of Cinna strong), and glares at Haymitch. Peeta is still wilting, exhausted, and she gets him a glass of water, wordlessly daring Haymitch to command her to sit down, to command her to do anything at all. He waits until she's given Peeta his water and sat down beside him to chew her out.

"What the hell was that?" he spits at her. Peeta looks surprised. She's not sure if he's more surprised that Haymitch didn't know or that Haymitch's anger is directed solely at her.

"That was Peeta, having an episode," she tells him, her voice as deadly as his. "You may not have noticed, but after the hijacking, he had some side effects."

"Why the hell didn't you tell me? Did you tell anyone?"

"I didn't want to tell anyone." Peeta's voice is hoarse but firm, and she looks at him worriedly. He's so weak after his episodes; she squeezes his hand under the table. "I don't want anyone else. I only want her."

She glows, flushed but exhilarated by his words. This doesn't go unnoticed by Haymitch, which pisses her off because it's none of his business.

"That's nice," Haymitch snarls, sarcastically, "but did either of you star-crossed lovers think about the fact that you were programmed to kill her and _only her_?"

They shrug in unison.

"She could take me," he mutters, and Haymitch scoffs. He's furious, Katniss realizes, not only because he wasn't told, but also because he's genuinely worried about her.

"He's never tried to hurt me," she tells him, a rush of affection making the words spill out. "Never. He's even gentler than usual."

"But he still thinks you killed his family."

Well, there's no denying that: he just saw it happen. He turns on Peeta, his wrath subdued somewhat by silencing Katniss.

"They all about her?" he asks brusquely.

"Yes, but…" Peeta's muttering, blushing, and she suddenly knows that she doesn't want Haymitch to hear this. "I love her the most. That's why they're all about her."

The chair hitting the floor as Haymitch jumps to his feet, his fists slamming on the table, makes her jump but it scares the hell out of Peeta. He whimpers, wraps his arm around her waist, his face in her neck, shaking like a leaf. He clings to her for dear life, as if he's still in the middle of his episode. She puts a comforting hand on his back, rubbing it, but she's more focused on how pissed she is at Haymitch.

"He just had an episode! What the hell's wrong with you?"

"What is wrong with _you_?" Haymitch explodes. "He doesn't have episodes about you because he loves you, he has them because he was _programmed _that way!"

"It's not because of any programming or hijacking!" Peeta insists, facing Haymitch but still clinging to her, his voice shaking. He's angry. Even with the gravity of the situation, she can't help but notice how incredible he looks when he's angry.

"Right," scoffs Haymitch, disgusted at Peeta's unshakable faith in his love for her, in Katniss' unshakable faith in her ability to survive anything, "the Capitol has nothing to do with this. This is what true love always looks like. Obviously, I'm the deluded one here. _What the hell are you thinking_?" He's whirled on her now, and she glares at him, not wavering.

"You're the one who told me he needs me," she says, and though it might be mean (she doesn't do it because he needs her, she does it because she loves him), it has the desired effect. For the first time, Haymitch looks shaken.

"Go help Delly unpack," he tells Peeta, and Katniss begins to protest before she realizes that it's exactly what she wants: to talk to Haymitch, make him understand in a way she can't in front of Peeta. She and Haymitch make drunken promises in the middle of the night, and if they're really going to solve this, they can't have any of Peeta's brightness, any of his hope. He nods, and she feels something she can't remember feeling in a long time, but she pushes it aside. She can't worry about Peeta and Delly; she has to convince Haymitch she's right.

As soon as he's out of earshot (though not too far, because she can still hear Delly gushing over him), Haymitch looks at her, eyebrows raised. She sighs.

"I can't leave him alone," she admits, her voice soft. "You gave me hell for leaving him alone in the arena, and it's…it's just as bad." She feels an immense catharsis in confessing this: that the moment Peeta sinks into an episode, he's once again a piece in their Games, and by extension, so is she.

"What happens if you're not there?" he asks, and his voice is quiet. She always marvels at the shorthand she and Haymitch speak in, whether it's with or without words.

"Last time I wasn't there, he stabbed himself in the hand," she shoots back. Haymitch sighs.

"Well, why can't you come get me? Maybe I could—"

"Dammit, Haymitch," she growls, "I can't _leave _him, can't go anywhere when he's like that! I don't have time to show up at your door like a scared little girl and ask for your goddamn help!"

"He _is_ going to hurt you," Haymitch growls at her, "and I'm offering you an out, sweetheart."

"I don't want your out," she hisses at him. "And even if I did, you'd be drunk. I invited you over for dinner a month ago and you still haven't showed up, because you're drunk all the—"

"Oh, knock it off," he interrupts, "Stop pretending you wouldn't _be_ me if it weren't for him." He's right: she would be. She sighs.

"Look," she says, "we need each other, because he's actually glad there's people here. You need to be my ally." He nods; this was never up for debate.

"Maybe, if we're a team, we can get them to leave," she suggests. This would be perfect: the three of them, the deranged and the drunk, alone in the only place she's ever felt at home. Peeta will bake. Haymitch will drink. She will…but the way Haymitch shakes his head, suddenly avoiding her eyes, tells her far more than she wanted to know.

"They're not going anywhere, are they?" she asks. Her voice comes out deadly, the sound reminding her of her bowstring taut before a kill. He shakes his head again, glances around for alcohol (as though the first thing Delly would move in would be liquor—_she's _supposed to be the deluded one?). She waits him out, lets full minutes pass while he avoids her gaze, and when he finally makes eye contact, he sinks into a chair as if her hateful gaze has physically wounded him.

"You son of a bitch," she hisses. "You knew? _You knew!_ And you didn't warn us? Where the hell do you get off being pissed at me for keeping things from you? _What the_ _hell is your problem_?"

She's having trouble keeping her voice down, desperately does not want Peeta to hear this. She's the one who is identical Haymitch, who understands his damage, but she is too mad to understand right now. She drains the glass of water Peeta left on the table.

"When did they call you?" she asks, trying to keep her voice level. He sighs.

"About a week ago. Asked how you were. If I'd known he was like this, I wouldn't have—"

"Shut the hell up," she snaps. He does. "If you'd had the decency to tell us, you would've known this a hell of a lot sooner."

"I was trying to protect you," he mutters, his voice soft. "You said I was still your mentor."

She's not sure whether she wants to punch him or burst into tears. She did say that; she meant it. He's the closest thing she has to a parent now. But why the hell doesn't he trust her? Why couldn't he have told her this, given her some warning?

"Did they ask if we were stable or did they just tell you people were moving back?" she asks, and she wants to put the venom back in her voice, but she's drained. She's suddenly as exhausted as she is after a nightmare. This _is_ a nightmare.

"They told me they were coming back eventually, asked if you two were stable enough to handle the first wave now. I told them you were."

"We're not," she replies automatically, but her mind is fixed on something else. _First wave_?

"There will be more then?" she demands. He nods.

"They—well, okay, Paylor—wanted to give you time to…to, uh…" He has no idea how to phrase it.

"To regain sanity?" she suggests. "To stop assassinating the wrong person? To stop singing while I starve myself to death? To stop hallucinating the ghost of my dead sister? To-"

"Neither of you were stable enough to be around people," he says, interrupting her. "Dr. Aurelius suggested you be left in solitude, or some semblance of it, for awhile. Said you…uh, both of you…weren't ready yet."

The way he's avoiding her eyes tells her everything. They held off on returning because _she_ wasn't stable enough. They did this for _her_. Peeta wasn't a danger anymore, if they sent him back here with her. He loves people, always has, and if their doctor deemed him stable enough to be around her, he's stable enough to be around anyone. It's her, the crazy soldier who killed the wrong president, their damaged Mockingjay; she needed the time in solitude. They slowed the progression of the district for _her_. She wants to feel gratitude, but mostly, she just feels sick.

"I'm still not ready," she mutters, but the words stick in her throat. This is Delly's home, Greasy's Sae's home, Thom's home. It belongs to them just as much as it belongs to her. And she's the one who made them wait, after everything they've been through, to come back home. _She_ didn't have to wait, despite the fact that she's the damaged one, the destructive one. She is an inferno, destroying everything, not even considering anyone but herself as long as the flames are still burning. Finally, she is starting to get an idea of the effect she can have.

Haymitch clears his throat.

"Yeah, well, I'm not ready for company either. And I'm only being your ally if you keep me informed about him and let me help," says Haymitch gruffly. Clearly his time being her gentle mentor, her only remaining parent, has come to a close.

"I'm not running over to your place every time he has an episode," she tells him, and a bit of the anger is back in her voice. It may be fake, but it certainly makes her sound stronger.

"So, why don't we agree that you'll come over more often, and then you can figure out how to help me from there?" The way she says it makes it sound like she might need his help, but it seems to make him happy. Maybe he just needs to be needed.

"Is it getting better?" he whispers. This is what his agreement hinges on. And, though it isn't, she says, "Yes."

**Reviews make me smile. **


	18. jealousy

**As always, your amazing reviews make me smile SO much and blush a very bright shade of red. You guys are wonderful. Thank you! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

The rest of her day is spent helping Delly unpack. The boy, Dalton, has disappeared and the thought of leaving Peeta with Delly when he's just had an episode is unbearable. Something is welling up in her, some emotion that makes her face warm and her blood hot, and she can't name it for the life of her.

Watching Delly and Peeta together, laughing at things from their school days, is a knife in her heart. They're so happy, so satisfyingly nostalgic that even Peeta looks carefree. She feels like an intruder on their joyful optimism. She is not happy, not nostalgic, not optimistic. She's broken: doesn't have enough sanity to name her own emotions. She wants to hate Delly but she can't. The only person she's truly capable of hating anymore is herself.

Peeta is beside himself at having friends here again. Greasy Sae drops by to tell him she and her granddaughter will be living in his house (after a pointed question about where he sleeps that makes both of them blush), and suggests that he join her in feeding the people who now make up their district. Greasy Sae will cook her usual stews and soups, Peeta will bake. The idea of having someone cook while he bakes reminds him of his family, of his home.

It turns out that they're not here solely because they wanted to return home. Paylor wants to rebuild the districts, to turn them into places that will provide resources for everyone to share, resources not to be destroyed by greed and Games. They're here to rebuild, to turn this back into something resembling the place where she grew up. Though apparently, people won't be starving, since they won't be mining coal, they'll be growing food. Everyone is living in Victor's Village until they've cleaned up in town. She has no idea what "cleaned up" means, since she hasn't set foot in what used to be town since she's been back. She's so confused; was sure that this was just a larger prison for the drunk and the mentally deranged. She was confined here until they figured out what to do with her, real or not real? Real- they had no idea what to do with their precious Mockingjay after the war, but Plutarch told her that she'd be useful if there was another one. Does this mean there won't be another one? Maybe…maybe this _will_ be the one that sticks. The idea warms her, makes her somewhat grateful for all the faces. Maybe, with so many living people here, she'll stop seeing ghosts. She doubts it, but she tries to cling to some of Peeta's optimism, some of Delly's joy. It drains her in less than a minute. How do they do it all day?

They're trying to get her to join in the conversation, but she doesn't know how. It's too much for her to take in. She hasn't talked to anyone but Peeta or Haymitch in months and they give her time to take things in. Greasy Sae, Delly: they have no idea that she's a burned-out shell of the girl she was. They don't take her silence as anything extraordinary. She was always quiet.

Finally, Delly's unpacked, and Dalton's come home, and though they're invited for supper, Katniss pretends she isn't hungry. She can't stomach it for one more minute: after having solitude, or near-solitude for so long, she can't handle the different voices. Her head is going to burst. So she shakes her head at their offer of dinner and goes to leave, only to find that Peeta, too, claims not to be hungry and is leaving with her. He takes her hand on the walk home, and though she would normally push it away, she finds she _wants_ Delly to see, to know that for now he still belongs to her.

She feels strange when they're back home, as if she's with a stranger.

"Are you hungry?" he asks, and she nods, finds that her stomach is growling.

He goes about getting some buns he'd made the day before, and she watches the muscles in his back in admiration. She's trying to drink him in, take in as much as she can about him, because it's been made so clear to her today that he needs people, has needed them all along. He needs people who are real, not people who are half-ghosts like she is.

"It was nice to see Delly again," she mutters, forcing the lie out of her mouth as she flops in a chair. He puts a cheese bun in front of her, sits across from her with his own. He remembers her favorite and this brings a small smile to her face.

"It was great," he agrees, though he has a strange expression on his face.

"You really like her, huh?" she asks, and he shrugs, avoids the question.

"I think it'll be great to open shop with Greasy Sae," he tells her, and at that, she actually smiles.

"You two will be a wonderful, if unconventional team," she agrees. Her cheese bun is amazing, and she's thinking of some of Greasy Sae's dishes, soups she actually enjoyed despite the fact that she knew the ingredients.

"She'll need game," he reminds her. "So you'll be on our team, too."

"Right," she mutters, nodding noncommittally. She's not sure what is going to happen to her, with this shift in the dynamic. She isn't sure that she won't end up starving to death if (when) Peeta leaves her. She so often forgets to eat and was so used to hunger for so long that it doesn't seem to affect her the way it should. Maybe she'll just move in with Haymitch and drink herself to death. Maybe she'll head into the woods and never come back.

They finish in silence and ascend the stairs. She looks at him as they're about to go into their separate rooms.

"Stay with me?" she requests. She doesn't want to ask this, doesn't want to need him in her bed, but she needs to take advantage of the time she has left.

"Always," he sighs, his voice soft. They go into her room this time, which is good, since it's bigger. Things are awkward for a moment as she realizes she usually sleeps in her underwear. She considers finding pajamas, but he doesn't have any. She pulls off her sweater, is in a tiny camisole and unsure what to do about pants. He's pulling off his sweaty shirt, his back to her, when he speaks.

"Did you really think it was nice to see Delly?"

He turns around to raise an eyebrow at her. He's pulling off one sock with the other foot. She raises her chin again. It makes her braver.

"No," she admits. "It wasn't my favorite thing."

"And why is that?" he asks, eyes gleaming. She has no idea what he's getting at.

"I dunno," she tells him. "I don't like having people here. I don't like people."

He laughs, lets his pants fall to the floor. What the hell is he doing? Why is he—

"You were fine seeing Greasy Sae," he reminds her, and now he's crossing the room to her. She's standing in front of her dresser, still wondering what to do with her pants.

"I like Greasy Sae," she tells him. "I just…Delly's really touchy, and she's too bubbly, and she—"

She's cut off from what was quickly becoming a rant by his lips on hers. She gasps into his mouth, which gives him the perfect opportunity to slide his tongue into her mouth with an intensity she has never seen from him. He's hitched up one of her legs onto his hip, one hand below her thigh and the other on her lower back, arching her into him. She was already arching into him, one hand on his bare chest, the other on the back of his neck.

"You don't like seeing me with Delly," he grunts. She's never seen his eyes like this before: he is on fire.

"No," she tells him, and she finds her voice strong, firm. "I want to scream at her to get her hands the hell off of you."

He moans, a sound of want, and it sets her on fire. He wants her. He lifts her up, setting her on the dresser, wrapping her other leg around his waist. He pulls back from the kiss, running her lower lip between his teeth, before he starts pressing kisses down her throat. He scratches his teeth over the point where her neck meets her shoulders, and she cries out, both her hands on the back of his head, urging him to keep going.

"You…are..._so…_hot…when you're…jealous..." he moans in between kisses. He only has to say the words for her to realize this is exactly what she's been feeling: jealousy. She should've just asked him about her feelings. He knows them better than she does, anyways.

His eyes are dark and hazy when he pulls his face back up to hers. He kisses her, intently, and she pulls him closer, her legs around his waist. And now she gets to kiss him, taste him, her lips on his neck, teeth on his collarbone, tongue in the hollow of his throat… He's groaning, making noises she's never heard before.

She isn't sure how much longer she can deny needing him, because right now, in this moment, she's pretty sure she'd rather starve to death than lose him.

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	19. Prim

**You guys are amazing. Your reviews keep me going and brighten my smile so much. Thank you!**

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

After Peeta's asleep, she tiptoes downstairs for a glass of water. She's exhausted, confused by what just happened. Jealousy brings something out in her, something out in him, that she's not sure they're quite able to handle. She's the girl on fire, an inferno that she has no basis for controlling. But he's the calm one, the decent one, the only Victor who was ever a truly _good _person. So why isn't he the one…calling for a ceasefire? Because while she loves his skin on hers, his lips all over her, she's not sure about sex. She doesn't want to deny him anything, but…and she loves him. And he loves her, that's a given. But…they're so young. Children, really. But they're not, haven't been children in a long time. Their childhoods are over.

It's the first time in a very long time that Katniss genuinely misses her mother. She wants to call her, ask about this, because there is no one to give her advice or guidance. The idea of going to Haymitch is laughable. But her mother couldn't face the ashes and the ghosts. Her mother doesn't need her, doesn't even want her. So how can she call and ask about…this? She never talked about boys with her mother. She never really talked about anything important. And giving herself to Peeta this way, admitting to him that she loves him…She sighs, finishes her water.

What she really needs to do is figure out what she wants. Because while she's incredibly good at being wanted, she's not very good at doing the wanting herself. She wants him, sure, but it's nothing compared to the inferno raging in him, equal parts love and lust and…something else, something she's never seen in anyone else. No one loved Haymitch like her loved her. In fact, she's sure that no one loves anyone as much as he loves her. That's what's kept them alive, all this time, really. Not her ferocity or courage or allure, but Peeta's quiet, relentless love.

She sighs, again, and heads into the studio, pulling the sheet off of his paintings of her. She's determined to sit here, go through them one by one, and begin to understand what it is he sees in her, why he loves her. Because, in their honest moments, they both know she's not particularly pretty and she's quite a piece of work.

She starts at the beginning: a portrait of her as a child, with the two braids in the red dress. There's a bird perched on the window, cocking its head as if listening to her. And the next one: Katniss lying in the cave, a small smile on her face. There's love and devotion in every brush stroke, but it doesn't bring her any closer to understanding. It's the next painting that does that. Because the next painting is of Prim.

Not Prim as a child, the little girl Peeta saw every day at school. No, this is not the little girl whose name was called at the Reaping. This is her sister as a young woman, the girl who risked her life to bring medicine to children, the girl who Katniss loved more than anyone. Prim is lying on her back in the lake…but Prim never went to the lake, was never taught to swim, and she's confused before she realizes that Peeta wouldn't know about the lake either. No, he's merely painted her in a lake to effectively put out the flames that ended her life. Katniss feels tears on her cheeks, but she can't remember feeling this happy since Prim died. This is how she wants to picture her little sister: not calling to her, blood on her hands, shirttail untucked the moment before she explodes into flames, but lying on her back, smiling, at peace in still waters with no Games and no rebellion to worry about. This is how she'll picture Prim from now on: as a young woman at rest, perhaps too early, but at rest nonetheless.

"Shit!" She hears his voice before he touches her, pulling her away from the painting. "Katniss, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean for you to see that, I know it must upset you, I meant to put it with the paintings from the Games and I forgot because I was distracted by all the people…" He's staring at her in alarm, can't seem to read the expression on her face.

"Please, please, say something?" She can't, though: can't tell him that this hasn't upset her, merely given her the most amazing gift. Almost as good as his love. She has no words, was never good with words anyways, so she kisses him. He kisses back tentatively, still expecting the backlash: anger, tears, frustration…

"You gave me back my little sister," she whispers. "She's not…she's not on fire anymore."

Peeta looks at her, gently cups her face.

"She's not," he agrees. "She's happy now, wherever she is."

She kisses him hard, passionately, and her mind is made up without her really even having to consider it. She wants him, all of him, right now. She doesn't want to wait to figure out if she needs him or if he needs her, if they could survive without each other or not. For now, that isn't what she needs to know. She needs to know that she is in the arms of the only man who could bring Prim back to her, the only person who truly understands what losing Prim meant. No one else could _ever _ease this pain.

He responds to her with enthusiasm, lifting her up, and she wraps her legs around him as he carries her up the stairs, lays her down gently on her bed. He is tentative, as he takes off her clothes, waiting for her to pull away. She's given him good reason for this, she supposes, but there will be no pulling away tonight. She can't remember the last time she wanted something physically and emotionally at the same time, but she wants this, wants him in her body and her heart, and she plans on keeping him there for a long time.

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	20. kitchen table

**So...**blushes**… I've never had more than a hundred reviews before. I don't even know what to say. Other than…THANK YOU! You people make me smile on the worst of days.  
**

**This turned out a teeny bit like a filler. We'll get back to the serious stuff soon, I promise. But…it's also my favorite chapter (I know, I said that about ch. 8. But I changed my mind). **

**I do not own the Hunger Games. **

The next few weeks pass in a blur. She learns that Delly is married to the boy, Dalton, that they're here because he's a stoneworker. She's pissed that Peeta didn't tell her this right away, let an entire week pass where she was hot with jealousy every day (which he took advantage of every night, precisely why he didn't tell her). Haymitch comes around a couple of times, but now that Peeta isn't pushing himself into the episodes, they're much less frequent, and so there's not a whole lot for him to do. Eventually, he just gets drunk and stops coming.

Peeta and Greasy Sae make the most amazing team; they feed everyone, work out of Greasy Sae's house, Peeta's old house, and she can tell that Peeta loves being part of a community again, loves baking for a great number of people, not his washed-up mentor and her. She brings game for the soup and stews, loves having an excuse to hunt more and for longer, because she still isn't strong enough to handle a lot of people all at once. She also goes to visit Haymitch more, pretending to follow up after Peeta's episodes, really just craving his company because he, too, hates that there are people here. She loves that they can sit in solitude for hours on end, not speaking, watching the others with narrowed eyes. She can't do that with Peeta—the only time he's really quiet is when he's falling asleep, his fingers running through her hair. He chatters endlessly at her: about Greasy Sae's soup, about the bread he wants to bake tomorrow, about Delly and Dalton's wedding…The only thing he doesn't talk about, in fact, is them.

Things have been different since that night, the night she found the painting of Prim that now hangs in their living room. They sleep in the same bed, familiar scars against each other, and he kisses her awake every morning. She's not sure how to qualify what happens in between, but the idea that they are a couple doesn't seem so laughable anymore. She hunts and cooks, even cleans their house now that he's out so much. She tries to keep busy with these things so that her mind won't occupy itself with the only question that matters anymore: can she survive without him? The question of choice is null and void. She can clearly survive without Gale, she has for months now. But…could she survive without Peeta? She tells herself she could, while she traps and shoots and skins animals, cooking meat pie for Haymitch, washing their clothes and blankets. He comes home to her every night, face bright, full of stories about Greasy Sae and the people who occupy Victor's Village, people whose names he knows, stories he is learning. She's too confused to remember their faces, much less anything else. She's more confused about why he's still with her.

The only thing she's sure about with Peeta is that she loves his hands on her, his lips on her. She hasn't stopped pulling away emotionally, or going still every time she thinks she might need him, but when it comes to being with him physically, she's stopped playing games, stopped pulling away. She doesn't initiate anything, but he is more than capable of doing that, and she never resists. She has never wanted anything so badly (wanted, not needed, she reminds herself) than she wants him, and he is always so eager to comply.

Fall is hanging in the air the night he comes in the door covered head to toe in flour. She is sweeping their kitchen after she spent the day making new arrowheads and getting wood chips everywhere, and she bursts out laughing. He smiles; a different person than the boy muttering in his sleep that she'd kissed good-bye this morning. She's mashed potatoes and glazed carrots for supper, was getting frustrated that he wasn't home yet, but her dinner and her cleaning and her frustration are all forgotten as she doubles over in laughter, kept standing by her broom. He slams the door, glaring at her, but ruefully, unable to keep the smile off his face.

"What the hell happened to you?" she giggles, trying to wipe some from his bicep. He is absolutely covered: his hair, his ears, his biceps, forearms, chest…

"I'm not telling," he snaps childishly, pushing past her to go to the sink, washing up, brushing the flour off roughly. "People who laugh at me don't get to know that I lost a flour fight with Greasy—"

He's cut off by her roar of laugher, and this time she can't stay standing, has to collapse into a chair.

"You _lost_ a fight with…" He's glowering at her, and she sees as he's drying his hands that he's missed patches of flour on his chest, his shoulders, his face, and this only makes her laugh harder.

"She's stronger than she looks," he mutters, peeking at the supper she's prepared.

"No, she's not!" cackles Katniss, "and you're double her size!"

She can't remember the last time she laughed this hard, that her laughter was louder than her screams. He leans against the counter, arms crossed, and she wipes away the tears that have trickled down her cheeks.

"I'm s-sorry," she manages, rising and crossing to him. "You just look so darn cute." He raises his eyebrows at her.

"I always look cute," he mutters, pouting, and she kisses his lips, pulling the lower one between her teeth.

"Sure you do," she mutters, "but if you want me to stop focusing on how cute you are and eat dinner, we better get rid of this." She wipes away some flour that's sticking to his T-shirt, over his chest. He raises his eyebrows at her. She's never the one who initiates physical closeness between them, even if she is incredibly enthusiastic once it begins.

"And this," she whispers, brushing some from his cheek. There's a spark in his eyes.

"And this," she whispers, and she licks some off the side of his neck.

He's so quick after that she's confused: one minute they're standing by the counter, the next she's flat on her back across the kitchen table, and his hands are all over her, his lips on her neck. She moans, wrapping her legs around his waist, pulling him closer. It's not enough, and she pulls his shirt over his head.

"I'm coming home covered in flour more often," he gasps, his lips trailing over her collarbone while he pulls off her sweater.

"Oh, God, please do," she moans, pulling him on top of her so his lips are on hers. She's groaning as his hands move to her waist, tugging her even closer to him, and she's—

"What the _hell_ are you doing?"

The voice is familiar, but the tone is not. She's never heard Haymitch embarrassed before. He's standing in the entryway of their kitchen, glaring at them, his face beet red, as theirs must be. He turns to go and she giggles as she runs after him, straightening her camisole, Peeta trailing behind her, pulling his shirt on.

"Haymitch, stop," she calls as she sees he's down the steps of their porch. "Come back, we didn't mean to—"

"You told me to come over if I was hungry!" he yells, and she's blushing as she sees that there are others watching, Delly and Dalton among them, and that Peeta's still pulling his shirt on.

"You didn't tell me you'd be going at it on the kitchen table!" Now she's embarrassed, her face red, and she protests.

"We weren't _going at it_ on the kitchen table," she tells him, trying to keep her voice down, but the houses aren't far enough apart for the others not to hear her.

"Yet," adds Peeta helpfully. She glares at him and he winks at her.

"I'm not eating off that table," Haymitch tells them, but she can see even he wants to smile. She feels a strange swooping of possessive pride: annoying as he is, Haymitch announcing this to the entire Victor's Village makes it beyond clear that Peeta is _hers_, that he belongs to her now, that it's her he's laying across the kitchen table, no one else. She feels herself blushing again.

"Come in," she insists to Haymitch. "We'll wash the table."

He makes them eat in the living room anyways.

**Reviews make me smile. **


	21. her graveyard

**Lovely readers: I'm so sorry my updates have been slower. I've been agonizing over some stuff, more for the next chapter than this one, but it's slowing me down. I won't ever let it go more than a few days. Promise! **

**Also- your reviews make my life better. Although I do "have a life and all", I promise not to make Peeta magically healed just because he's "getting laid and has company". Seriously, you people make me smile like I just won the lottery. **

**Oh. Hunger games. Not mine. **

Haymitch never again enters their house without knocking. This annoys her beyond reason, because his impromptu visits were made better by his terrible manners, and now he stands and waits patiently at the door even when he knows Peeta isn't home.

She's coming to find herself, and her sanity, more and more. She tells herself it has nothing to do with Peeta, the way he wraps around her while she's sleeping, making her feel safe. It has nothing to do with how happy he makes her, the hope he gives her. That is not why her sanity is coming back: it's…it's something else, and that's all there is to it.

They're told that, despite the fact that new houses are built and ready to move into in town, Victor's Village will stay filled with people, because a new group is arriving as soon as this one moves into town, and they'll need somewhere to live. The bakery for Peeta and Greasy Sae is almost finished. She'll live above the shop and a family will move into Peeta's old house. Katniss isn't sure how she feels about there being children here.

She's become part of the team, hunting and digging up plants. Delly has asked her twice if she can help with the plants, but thus far, Katniss hasn't found it in herself to let anyone else into the woods with her. Part of her wants other people there, wants to let Delly in because then she might be less lonely…but it is _her _graveyard, the place she goes to mourn, and she isn't ready for it to be filled with living people quite yet.

It's cold out the day she has a terrible encounter with Thom when she goes wandering through what used to be town to see the new bakery. Peeta won't stop raving about it but she wants to look at it alone, without him. She's still desperately clinging to her independence. Thom is wheeling a cart and she waves as he gets closer. Then, as she sees the dead, decayed, skeletal bodies that fill his cart, she turns and vomits into the dirt. Thom sighs, sympathetic, and pats her on the back.

"Where are you putting them?" she asks.

She needs to know where she can and can't go. Part of regaining her sanity has been sorting through reality, playing the real and not real game, even without Peeta. The reality is that she simply cannot handle seeing dead bodies.

Thom's face registers shock as he answers her.

"We've dug a mass grave in the Meadow. Didn't you know?" She stares at him, shakes her head numbly. True, she doesn't wander the entire woods, is afraid to venture too far from her snare line and the lake. But…

She's throwing up again, somehow on her knees, retching into the dirt, unable to get the smell of decayed bodies and putrid roses out. Thom tries to rub her back, maybe he does rub her back and she's just too far gone to feel it. She stands and runs, faster than she knew she could, into Peeta's old house, where he and Greasy Sae have made pots of turkey soup and fresh dill bread.

His face lights up when he sees her, as it always does. But his expression quickly changes as she slaps him.

"What was that for?" he demands, angry. She's crying so hard she can barely breathe, and she collapses into his arms. She's pretty sure he holds her fairly begrudgingly.

"Why'd you keep talking about town?" she demands, as soon as she's coherent enough to be capable of speech. Greasy Sae has pretended she needs something in the pantry, giving them their privacy.

"Why did you tell me to go somewhere that isn't a town, just a graveyard, just a reminder of all the people I've killed?" She's sobbing, hard, and he clings to her tightly.

"I didn't," he whispers. "I didn't tell _you_ to go there. I never imagined you'd go there on your own, and I wasn't going to take you until—"

"Of course I went on my own!" she snarls. She's wild, a feral animal. "I don't need you to take me places or tell me things I already know. I don't _need_ you at all."

He looks more hurt than when she'd slapped him.

"I never said you did," he whispers, after it's clear that she's not going to apologize or take it back. "I just meant…I didn't think you'd go on your own. I didn't mean to hold out on you. I'm sorry."

"They're burying them in my Meadow," she whispers, and he wipes the tears off her cheeks. She feels guilty, ashamed: shouldn't she be comforting him? Or is she not allowed to comfort him when she's the one hurting him?

"I know," he whispers. "I'm sorry."

She gets up, wiping away her tears furiously. She doesn't want his apologies.

"Don't ever hold out on me again," she tells him, and she leaves.

That night, in bed, after she's refused to acknowledge him, turning to face the wall, tucking her knees into her chin, he whispers sweet things to her until she rolls over, meets his eyes.

"I didn't know you'd try," he said. "I didn't know you were…"

"Stable enough? Sane enough? Stupid enough?" she offers, when words fail him. Since when do words fail _him_?

"…listening," he admits. "I didn't know you cared. I thought you tuned me out whenever I talked about there being people here."

"I don't tune you out," she whispers, guilty again, her hands on his face. "I don't know how anymore."

He kisses her and she lets him. But as he pulls her on top of him, she knows her words are echoing in both of their heads.

_I don't need you at all. _

Though they don't have fresh game for a few weeks after that incident, she eventually sneaks under the fence again. This time she goes looking for it. She shakes violently when she sees it, this gaping hole in her Meadow, a pit filled with a thousand unspoken apologies she should have said when she had the chance. This _is_ her personal graveyard; she is responsible for every single one of those deaths. It is _her_ fault. Somewhere in the pit of decayed bones is Madge, Madge's parents, Peeta's _family…_

She's throwing up again, screaming into the dirt, saying words she's never heard herself say, words that are worse than Johanna's curses when she was coming off the morphling. Her screams do nothing, but she feels like maybe the throwing up helps. Perhaps her body is trying to draw out the poison; poison that was never in her body, always in her mind. She cries for a long time under the hot sun. Then she gets up and shoots three squirrels. At first she leaves them, unable to face any more death today, but then she feels like she's adding to her list of kills, putting more corpses in her precious woods. Tears blind her by the time she's shoving them, fur and all, at Peeta, and he leaves work immediately to sit on their couch and hold her until she stops crying. It takes a long time for her to hunt without feeling like a murderer. She wonders if she is a murderer, sits long hours in the sun, finally comes to the conclusion that it has so much to do with survival and intention. She would never kill anyone unless it was necessary for her survival (or Peeta's). She had never intended to destroy District 12. She is an inferno, causing destruction that she certainly can't control, but that she never, ever intends to happen. Eventually, they pour the dirt back in, cover up the grave. She won't walk on it. She still won't go into town.

She hadn't realized how much she'd been relying on Peeta until he doesn't come home one night. She'd finished hunting in the morning, dropped her game off with Greasy Sae, spent the afternoon washing their sheets down by the lake. Night is falling by the time she's finished supper, but she isn't really worried about him. He often works late, baking after they close so he can feed people breakfast and not get up at the crack of dawn. And besides, she's almost sure the days are getting shorter. But as time drags on…she begins to worry.

They've refused clocks since the Quell (and for her, 13, with that goddamn schedule on her arm), so she has no idea what time it is, but when she hears that Haymitch is up and yelling, she realizes that it is very, very late and Peeta hasn't come home.

She has no idea what to do: where to search, what to think. Perhaps he's off sleeping with Delly or that gorgeous blonde girl who frequents the bakery far more than she probably needs to. But she can't focus on the jealousy because deep down, she knows he wouldn't choose someone else when he can still have her. Deep down, she knows something is very wrong. So, Katniss does what she's learned to do in any crisis involving Peeta: she runs for Haymitch as though her life depends on it.

"Sweetheart, I've got better things to do than listen to stories about your love life," he slurs when she comes in the door without knocking.

"I don't know where he is," she snaps, "and you told me that I need to protect him."

Haymitch's eyes are unfocused and bloodshot. He's probably been through more alcohol tonight than she and Peeta could handle together in a month. She grabs his shoulders, shakes him. He pushes her off.

"So protect him," he slurs, gulping more. "I sure as hell can't do it. You two don't need me. You need each other."

"I don't need anyone," she corrects him, uncomfortable with how quickly drunk Haymitch can get to the heart of her most heart-wrenching dilemmas.

"Sure you don't, sweetheart," he laughs, "you don't need people at all. You pretty much just need woods and birds and a weapon."

He isn't making a whole lot of sense, but something in what he's saying is making her tremble.

"I don't need birds," she spits at him. He laughs.

"You're the Mockingjay!" he says, but it sounds more like he's singing it. He's so far gone, so shattered.

"And I sure as hell don't need my woods right now," she mutters, blushing. He nods.

"They buried some people out there," he tells her. As if she needs to be reminded. "People we killed, sweetheart. Let's drink to that."

That's what's making her shake. _They_ killed them, she and Haymitch, his involvement in the rebellion during the Quell, her arrow sent into the forcefield. They killed Peeta's family.

And then, of course, she knows where he is.

"Bye, sweetheart!" calls Haymitch as he takes off. She's not sure, but he might have toasted her as she left. Sometimes, she thinks he's more broken than she and Peeta put together.

Peeta's lying in the dirt on top of the grave. She feels both disgusted and ashamed, can barely breathe, but she lies down beside him anyways. She touches his shoulder. He takes her hand in his. He's shaking violently.

"I killed my family," he whispers.

"Not real."

"I'm not having a flashback, Katniss!" he yells, and his anger sounds so much louder out here than it does in their house. "I'm just telling the truth. It's my fault they're dead."

"It was Haymitch and I," she whispers. "His role in the rebellion. My arrow in the forcefield. Peeta, we killed your family."

He laughs, but she barely recognizes the sound. That is not what his laugh sounds like: mirthless, angry, cruel.

"Snow wasn't lying to me after all then," he mutters, and it's a knife in her heart. Because…whatever Peeta saw her as after the hijacking, that's what she was really like. She distinctly remembers hating him because he _finally _saw her as she truly was.

She sighs, lets the tears run down her face, says nothing. And then he's up, screaming into the night, throwing branches at the grave, kicking rocks up in an angry outburst she has never seen from him. He's not murderous, not hijacked: he's just angry. She vaguely remembers him angry and smashing things in 11 on the Tour, but that was nothing compared to this. She can't make out any of the words he's screaming, realizes he might not be screaming words at all. And then he's fallen, into the dirt, crawled back to her, and she cradles him into her chest. She's worried for a moment that he might hurt her, that the anger might trigger a hijacked-Peeta kind of rage. But he isn't raging anymore. Instead, he's crying. He's sobbing like an abandoned child, like a little boy who was orphaned and never got to say good-bye. She holds him tighter.

"They…they took so much from us," he weeps. "They took my family, our friends, our sanity, our hope. And we _never_ blame them. We blame ourselves, go round and round in circles of hatred and anger and doubt. Every time we blame ourselves, _they win_."

She's sobbing now, 're just frightened children, clinging together because togetherness is the only way they can fight back.

"We need to blame them, Katniss," he tells her. "_They_ killed my parents, hijacked me, reaped us, turned us into murderers. Please, _please_, could we blame them instead of ourselves?"

"Yes," she whispers, with all the conviction she can give it. "I don't want to be a piece in their Games anymore, Peeta."

He nods, sighs into her, takes her hand and lies beside her, looking at the stars. Both of them know they're not sleeping tonight.

**Reviews make me smile. **


	22. a very unexpected visitor

**As always, thank you SO much for your reviews, favorite-ing, etc. It makes my heart so happy. If my life were an ice cream sundae (man, that'd be sweet), you guys would be the awesome sauce. **

**Oh. Hunger games. Not mine. **

It happens on a brisk autumn day, one that makes her feel sure winter's coming and causes her to wonder, as she very rarely does, how long it's been since the war ended. She's sitting in the kitchen, waiting for eggs to cook, excited because the trains almost never bring eggs and because she has enough to bring to Haymitch. There's a knock at the door, loud and solid. She laughs, wandering over to answer it, already rolling her eyes at their mentor.

"Haymitch, you saw Peeta leave," she yells through the door. "And we're more careful now, about the table and what we do on it. You don't have to—"

She swings open the door and finds her tirade cut short by a very unexpected visitor. One of the only people she thinks she still might be capable of loving.

"Gale? What the hell are you doing here?" she asks, in shock. He smirks.

"I'll answer if you tell me what you and Peeta do on the table that has Haymitch so worked up?"

She blushes and stammers and he tugs on the end of her braid. Then she's in his arms, and this feels so familiar. Not romantic: she's made her choice (as if the choosing itself were ever the hard part; it's the needing him that's hard). But she isn't sure she wants to be in his arms. Not because of Peeta. Because of Prim.

She sees someone chattering with Delly over his shoulder and squints.

"Is that Johanna?"

"Oh, yeah, she came with me to…to…" It's the blush that gives him away, not his stuttering out an excuse for her being there. Katniss watches as Johanna teases Delly about something (probably monogamy, knowing Johanna), and she raises her eyebrows at Gale.

"Oh," is the only thing she can think of to say, since she never pictured them together, but she thinks she might be proud of him for moving on. She's not sure how she feels about anything right now: mostly, she feels numb, removed from the situation, as if she's sitting in a tree somewhere watching herself go through the motions.

She remembers her eggs, dashes into the kitchen just in time to save them, and then yells for him to join her. Johanna runs in long enough to punch her on the shoulder and ask where Haymitch is. Then she's off, leaving Gale and Katniss alone with the eggs.

"You moving back?" she asks as they eat. She's trying to keep her tone light, but there's nothing but heaviness in the air. There's always been a lot unspoken between them, but it's never been quite this uncomfortable. He shakes his head.

"No, but they've asked that the fence be pulled down, around the Meadow? So that everyone can gather."

The fence. Around her Meadow. Pulled down. She doesn't feel anything at first. She just feels numb. Because really, when they poured dead bodies into it, was it still _her _Meadow? Maybe it doesn't matter if there's a fence around it. But she felt like the fence was grounding her, reminding her where she was allowed to be and where she wasn't allowed to be. She might not be sane enough to stay out of town if there's no fence. She doesn't want to go into town, doesn't want to set foot in that graveyard. But if her Meadow is a graveyard itself, does it really matter if there's a fence around it? Is she insane for wanting to stay out of town but stay in the woods? Is that on a list of insanity symptoms: the insistence on staying in one graveyard in order to stay out of a different one?

She's gone still, so he reaches across the table for her hand. She pulls away.

"I'm in command of the team pulling it down. You can be there. We'll say good-bye. And it won't be for a couple days, anyways."

She nods, a puppet on a string. Is she still insane? She's angry, and hurt, and she isn't sure she wants Gale here. But they're tearing down the fence whether she agrees or not. And if she says good-bye to her woods with anyone, it _should_ be with Gale…shouldn't it? What about Prim? What about Peeta? Oh, shit. _Peeta_. How is he going to feel that Gale's here?

As if on cue, Gale finishes his eggs and says, "So where can I put my bag? You don't mind us staying here, do you?"

She shakes her head, and then leads him to her mother's old room, which is on the main floor. She's not sure she could handle them on the same floor as her and Peeta. And she's almost sure that he isn't aware Peeta lives here.

"Do you wanna hunt first and then visit Greasy Sae?" he asks, tugging on her braid again. She doesn't answer, unsure of what he'll say when he learns the exact mode of survival she's chosen.

They hunt, even though she's already gone hunting, and he's impressed by her snares. They shuffle around all the things they should talk about, and discuss his job, her snares, what to make with the goose she shot, and so on until afternoon has come and they're in their old spot, laid out on their backs. Then she sighs, turns to him with guilt on her face, and she whispers, "I chose Peeta."

He chuckles, staring up at the sky.

"Yeah, I kind of noticed," he tells her sarcastically, and she allows a smile to spread across her face. She used to only smile in the woods, or so Gale said, but now she smiles so often: waking up with Peeta's lips on her neck, when she's skinning rabbits to take for Greasy Sae's soup or finding herbs for Peeta's bread, when Peeta comes home covered in flour…

"Are you mad?" He smiles, shakes his head.

"I picked someone else, too," he reminds her. She nods. She has no idea what to say about that. And she has no idea what he and Johanna _are_. She somehow can't see them as a couple, but maybe they are. Maybe they'll get married and have seven children. She's almost giggling at the thought, and he stares at her. She really needs to figure out how to get her tattered mind to focus on the present, at least when she's with anyone who's not Peeta or Haymitch.

"Sorry," she mutters. "I'm not laughing at you."

"Sounded like you were," he teases, smiling, but she sees the unease behind his smile. Things are awkward, she realizes. And not just for all of the obvious reasons. Something between them has shifted; the ease with which they hunted and talked has disappeared. This surprises her, in a way, because if she was supposed to choose between them, shouldn't there be more of a competition? She feels so awkward with Gale, so out of place, so…insane. It's nothing like what she feels with Peeta: comfort and understanding mixed with lust that she still can't control. She certainly did the choosing part right…

She realizes she's been silent for too long, so in order to make conversation, she blurts out the first thing on her mind.

"I heard you two talking, you know."

"Who?" he asks, confused. She always forgets that other people don't follow her unspoken thoughts the way Peeta does.

"Johanna and I?" She rolls her eyes.

"Yes, I was in 2, under your window, and forgot to mention it." He throws a blackberry at her, which she picks off her shirt and eats.

"You and Peeta, when we were in the Capitol. I heard you talking about me."

He nods, remembering. She's silent for a moment, allowing him the space he needs to revisit that night (a night she never leaves), before delving back in.

"You were saying that neither of you knew what to do with me," she reminds him, and he chuckles, "and then you said…you said that if I had to choose between you, I would—"

"-pick whoever you think you can't survive without."

So, he remembers. She smiles, sinking back onto her elbows. Though she hadn't realized it until now, she needed validation of this statement: that it was real, that it was just as important as she thought it was. And Gale remembering, months and months later, has vindicated her.

"Why are you bringing this up?" he asks, throwing another blackberry but aiming this one at her mouth.

"You've made your choice." She nods; she has.

"It's the right one, by the way," Gale mutters, not looking at her now. "He's…he's good for you." She nods: he is.

"He is," she agrees. "I didn't think I'd ever get you to admit that."

"It's just the truth," he mutters. He's uncomfortable, she can tell. She starts to change the subject but he takes a deep breath and starts speaking all in a rush.

"Catnip, he gave up everything for you. He was tortured, he wanted to die for you, he…he claimed that he knocked you up in front of his own mother so you'd have a better chance of survival."

She giggles, can tell he's trying to lighten the mood with this last example. He pushes onward, though.

"He's…right for you, in a way I never was, never could be. We're both full of fire—raging, destructive, intense. He's what you need—brave and joyful, humble but captivating. I never could've…never could've fulfilled you, or made you happy the way he does."

He lets out a big breath, his cheeks on fire, and she can see he's wanted to say this for a long time. She smiles, grabs his hand now that it's clear on both sides that there's nothing romantic.

"Thanks," she whispers. He nods.

They're silent for a few minutes, before he asks again, "Why'd you bring this up? I mean…what's going on, that you need to revisit that night?" She sighs, sits up, trying to be ready for this conversation.

"I can't stop revisiting that night," she confesses. "I can't stop thinking about those words. I can't stop wondering what I'll do with them."

He's mystified: she's not making any sense.

"I mean, you're right, I've clearly made my choice, and yes, I made the right choice but…but…" She's stuttering now, not sure she can get this out. "You said whoever I _can't survive without_." He nods.

"I can survive without either of you," she tells him, and then her eyes well up.

"I mean, Prim died and I'm still here, so clearly I can _survive_ without anyone."

He looks at her sharply. They've avoided the subject of Prim's death thus far. She wasn't sure they were ever going to talk about it, hadn't intended to bring it up. But now that she has, they can't ignore it. It's as though there was a bubble growing between them, invisible but suffocating, prepared to completely take over their friendship and now she's burst it. There's going to be a whole lot of pain and anger before they can ever avoid this topic again. He sighs, looks at her. She's not going to start this conversation. She's not the one who…

"It was my bomb," he mutters. "It was…Coin took the prototype, used it without our permission."

"How did Beetee feel about that?" she asks, careful to keep her voice level. She can't get mad at him. This goes so much deeper than anger.

He sighs again, and when she looks at him now, she sees neither the young man she met in the woods nor the angry, determined soldier she'd known in 13. He is broken, and though he is older than she is, she sees a sad, wounded child. Not a Victor but a victim, a little boy reaped when he was too young and too weak to fight.

"Beetee attempted suicide the day after we found out," he whispers, and she stares at him.

She suddenly sees the hollows under his eyes as something far more sinister than she'd imagined. Perhaps he's not merely exhausted from his prestigious job. She wonders if he stays up at night, fights off flashbacks with a combination of alcohol, coffee, and sheer stubbornness. He's battling demons, just as she and Peeta are. He probably sees as many ghosts as she does.

"He was unsuccessful," Gale explains, and she hears the word as if it's a knife. That's what the doctors would have told him. _His attempt to take his life was unsuccessful_. But she doesn't begrudge Beetee this. Didn't she want to do the same thing?  
She looks at him, waits until he's looking into her eyes.

"What did you do the day after you found out?"

When he sighs, he's suddenly a much older man. But, to his credit, he doesn't cry.

"I thought about it," he admits. "I think we all did. You did. Jo did. I'm sure Peeta has once or twice. It's…it wouldn't be enough. I don't think death would be punishment enough for what I did."

"Killing all those kids," she whispers.

"Killing Prim," he responds. "Catnip, I killed your sister."

And now she's crying, and she can tell he wants to comfort her but doesn't know how. She doesn't want his arms anyways.

"You told me you were playing by the same rules Snow had when he hijacked Peeta," she whispers through her tears. "Gale…those are the _wrong_ rules. Those are rules for Games that end in death and destruction and hopelessness. The rules Snow played by, the Games he played: those Games _never_ go away. You play them forever. They are relentless in their pursuit of causing pain, of provoking insanity, of turning you into someone else—"

"That's what they did to me!" he bursts out, and she sees a familiar pain in his eyes: it's the same pain she sees in Peeta's after an episode, the same pain she's sure is in her eyes after a nightmare.

"They turned me into someone else! I was so determined to be noble and honourable. And instead, I turned into…well, I turned into a pawn in their damn Games."

"We're all pieces in their Games," she says, sighing. She's still in awe of Peeta's wisdom, his understanding of all the Games they would go on to play and how he'd told her about it before any of them started. She hadn't understood then, but she understands now. Trying not to be a piece in their Games…that's what keeps her up at night.

"I think they'll always own a piece of us," she admits. "Some part of us will always be a piece in their Games."

"I don't know how to do this," he explains, and now she can clearly hear how broken he is. He doesn't know how to live, has no idea how to keep on surviving.

"I…I can't live with the guilt. I can't live with the pain of knowing I caused—"

"I killed children in cold blood," she reminds him, cutting him off because he's not the only one who should feel guilty.

"In the Games, in the Quell. So did Peeta, Haymitch—hell, Gale, Johanna was even worse than the rest of us!"

"I know!" he cries, "but it isn't…it doesn't—you don't sleep at night, ever. Haymitch drinks until he can't see straight. Peeta used to argue with himself about things that weren't even real! And Johanna, Jo—"

He sighs. And then there's silence, no birds to break it, no animals for them to hunt.

Finally, he speaks.

"Do you think…do you think you could ever forgive me?"

** I split this into two parts because I didn't want to keep you waiting forever. Sorry for the little cliffy. I'll update as soon as I can. **

**Reviews make me smile. **


	23. best friend

**As always, thank you SO much for your reviews, favorite-ing, etc. The reviews for the last chapter were so wonderful and so helpful! You guys are fantastically encouraging. **

**The Hunger Games do not belong to me. **

"Do you think…do you think you could ever forgive me?"

She stares at him. Her first thought is a vehement no. Of course she can't forgive him. Her second thought is an undeniable yes. He's her best friend. She wants him back.

"I don't know," is what she says out loud. "I don't want to. Well…maybe I want to try. But I don't know how." He nods.

"I don't know how to forgive myself," he whispers. "I don't know how you Victors bear it."

She looks at him in disbelief, much like Finnick looked at her when she asked him how he bore it.

"We don't!" she says. "Obviously we don't. What'd you just say, about Haymitch drinking, my nightmares, Peeta's episodes? And that's just District 12!"

"But you're still alive. You're getting better," he whispers, and she hears the hope in his voice. He wants her to tell him it might be okay: that one day, he might get better. She can't. She's not going to lie to him. She thinks of Finnick again as she answers.

"We might be getting better, but it's taking us ten times as long to put ourselves back together than it did for us to fall apart in the first place. We're broken, Gale. We're always going to be broken. All of us."

"Johanna says it's all about taking it one day at a time," he says, quietly. "She says it helps if you don't let yourself remember their faces."

She sighs; this is incredibly true. She doesn't let herself remember Marvel or Glimmer's faces. But how could Gale ever forget her sister's beautiful face?

"What does she say to you?" Katniss asks. "I mean, how does she help you forget Prim's face?"

"She…she tells me it wasn't me, not really. It was Coin."

Katniss nods; this is true. But there's a deep-seated hatred, a searing pain in her. It was his fault. He let his anger turn him into a piece in their Games. He wasn't forced into it the way she and Peeta were. He was never reaped. He volunteered.

"She grounds me, " he explains. "Keeps me stable. Helps to put out the raging inferno that seems to burn in me all the time."

He grins at her, knows she has a similar inferno burning in her. But she's thinking about Johanna, so she doesn't smile at him. He sighs, again. She isn't sure she wants to hear about this. But as minutes pass with him staring at a tree, boiling with unspoken anguish, she just asks.

"How the hell did you two end up together anyways?" He almost smiles.

"We…she lives there, in Two. She had no family, no one left in Seven. So we ended up working together…" He sighs, looks at her as if to assess her stability. She thinks that this is quite unfair, seeing as he's the one who was just glaring at a tree.

"We've been on TV a lot," he tells her. She nods; Greasy Sae had told Peeta that. They don't have a TV, aren't interested in it. "We…we wouldn't let them put you two through that again," he explains.

She looks at him, shocked. They wouldn't let…she didn't know anyone would want them on TV anymore. They're insane: she's barely able to have a normal conversation with anyone and he has yet to go a week without having an episode where he asks her questions that everyone in Panem knows the answers to. Who the _hell _would want them on TV? She'd probably zone out and start screaming about graveyards, which would cause Peeta to start asking questions like: "We almost died on a beach, real or not real?" or "You killed the wrong president, real or not real?" Yeah, they'd be _great _on TV.

"No one would want us on TV," she tells him. He rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, the Mockingjay who they loved through the entire war effort and her perfect, captivating fake-husband, the only person to _ever_ regain sanity after hijacking… who would want to hear from them?" He's possibly as sarcastic as she's ever heard him. "You still don't know the effect you can have."

"Yes, I do!" she snaps at him. "But we're not stable enough. We're both scarred and burned and—"

"Right, brainless," he interrupts, making her glare at his nickname (no guesses where he's getting his terms of endearment from these days), "that's why Jo and I picked up the slack. You think either of us _like_ being in front of the cameras after what we went through? We're doing it for the two of you."

It takes a moment for his words to sink in. They still want them, after all this time: the star-crossed lovers from District 12. The Girl on Fire. The Boy with the Bread. And he and Johanna took up the task of placating the public so Peeta and Katniss could sort themselves out. She feels a wave of gratitude at his practicality, his kindness. _This _is her best friend.

But it still doesn't explain how he and Johanna ended up sleeping together.

"So, you just got to chatting when you were in make-up and—"

"They wanted us to do a propos at a beach," he explains, cutting her off. "Neither of us could handle it. I kept thinking of the Quell, of you and Peeta and that damn locket with my picture, and she…" He sighs.

"She can't handle water," whispers Katniss, remembering. Gale nods.

"She freaked. We ran off, got to talking. Catnip, she- she understands." Katniss nods. Of course she does.

"She knows what it's like to live with guilt like this, to have everything you do feel heavy and wrong. To know that you killed people that other people needed." (She shivers at this: the word _needed_. But she did need Prim). "To know that you…you will never be able to forgive yourself."

"She understands you," Katniss muses, and he nods. She sighs; that's not what she was wondering. She thinks about not asking, giving him privacy, but she isn't really interested in giving him privacy.

"Do you love her?"

"Yes." His reply is swift, unhesitant, unwavering. She smiles. Somewhere, beneath the anguish of Prim's death, she's happy for him.

"Do you still love me?"

He sighs. When he looks at her, he looks about a thousand years old. "I don't know how to love you anymore," he whispers. "I can't look at you without having everything weigh down on me even heavier than before. I…I can't look at you without seeing her."

She nods. She can't look at him without thinking of fire, destruction, death. She realizes that her subconscious has considered him a murderer from the moment those bombs went off. She just hasn't let herself consider it, feel it, until now. But…she remembers what she thought about a few days ago, sitting on top of the mass grave of bodies _she _killed. It all has so much to do with survival and intention. And he never intended to kill Prim. He just wanted to help make a world where people he loved could survive. In war, in these Games, there are casualties that no one ever intends. And though she wants to be furious with him for letting himself become a piece in their Games without being reaped…she volunteered to save Prim. Peeta volunteered to save her. How can she stay mad at Gale for volunteering? He may not have been reaped the way they were, but he volunteered for the same reasons they did. And though she may not know how to forgive him, she does know how to understand him. And that's a start.

"Do you love him?" he asks, and she nods.

"It's one of the only things I know for certain anymore," she whispers. He smiles.

"Do you love me?"

She sighs. He's still her best friend, really. He's still Gale. But…

"No," she says, unhesitant, unwavering. "You'll always be my best friend, but I can't look at you without thinking of her. I can't love you. I wouldn't know how."

"But you know how to love him?" He's not angry. He's genuinely curious. It may have been Gale's bomb that killed Prim, but Peeta tried to kill her.

"I do," she whispers. "And when I don't know how, he helps me."

"Jo does that with me," he says. "Sometimes I don't know how to…I don't know how to survive anymore. And that's when she…steps in." Katniss nods.

"You chose someone you couldn't survive without," she whispers, echoing his words. He smiles, tugs on her braid.

"So did you," he reminds her. She shakes her head vehemently.

"I don't need him. I could survive-"

"Catnip, I hate to break it to you, but you were never going to survive without him."

She's shaking her head, because he's wrong. He has to be.

"I could survive without him," she tells Gale, looking into his eyes. Seam eyes. "I don't need him."

Gale looks at her as if he doubts her sanity, after she's done such a good job of proving that she's regained it, or most of it.  
"You said you needed him," Gale reminds her, "on the beach, in the Quell, before you two basically started going at it onscreen." She blushes to the roots of her hair.

"We weren't _going at it_ onscreen," she mutters, wondering why she keeps having to defend herself against these accusations, "but…when I said that, that was before—I mean, things have changed…" She trails off, lost in her own thoughts.

What's changed, really? Not Peeta's feelings. Not hers. The only thing that's changed is that he was hijacked…but she loves him in spite of it. She thought she couldn't love a boy who wraps his hands around her neck in her nightmares…but she can. She does love him. And he's hers—he belongs to her, that hasn't changed. Snow may have tried to take him from her, but it's only her he wants during his episodes. He's…he's what grounds her, helps her to be sane, reminds her who she was. She was the Mockingjay. And she couldn't be the Mockingjay without him. She broke down the morning after the bombing because it was _impossible_ to be the Mockingjay without him, impossible to be separated from him. She couldn't handle being used against him, having him used against her. They need to be together. Apart, they're just frightened children. Without him, she's worthless. But does that mean she needs him? Because she can't need him, she can't, she—

"Before his hijacking, you mean?" asks Gale. He was trying to pause and give her space, but has yet to perfect the art of figuring out when she's too lost in her own thoughts to know what's going on. It's not his fault; she's the one who's still not stable enough to have a normal conversation.

"Things have changed because of the hijacking?" Gale asks, easing her back into the conversation once it's clear she isn't sane enough to understand.

"How's he doing, by the way? Obviously, he's a lot better if you two are together."

She stares at him, realizing that she's such an idiot, because she can't lie to him but she sure as hell can't tell him the truth. He _is_ better, but she's not sure Gale would consider him well enough to be living with her. Shit, he still doesn't know they're living together…

He's staring at her, waiting for her answer.

"He's…he's a lot better. Yeah, thanks for asking," she tells him, and then waits for him to call her out on her lie. But he nods, smiling.

"I can see why you'd think you could survive without him, even though you've said yourself that you need him," Gale continues, and she blushes. "But Catnip, if you could survive without him, would you be here?"

**Reviews make me smile. **


	24. would you be here?

**Thanks for all your lovely reviews! You guys make me so happy.**

So, I was asked an excellent question by a reviewer that really got my mind whirling. If you're not interested in my rambling, by all means, please move on to the main event. If you are: KittyBread asked: "Here is the thing: 'I love you because I need you' or 'I need you because I love you'. Which one?

I think, for Katniss, it's both. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think she'll only admit to loving him BECAUSE she needs him (and hasn't admitted that yet), and she needs him BECAUSE he is the one she loves most, the one she's always loved most. She's unwilling to admit that and ergo unwilling to admit she needs him. I think to her, love and need are, as KB suggested, inextricably intertwined, but love she'll allow to because it's an emotion. Need she won't because it has its foundation in survival. That's basically what I'm basing all her stream-of-consciousness ramblings on. Anyways, sorry for that rant. I just felt like it was necessary. Onwards!

**The Hunger Games (still)do not belong to me.**

Gale has the most unnerving technique of asking the right questions and casting the right aspersions on her character that no one else has. It's a skill that keeps her up at night, tossing and turning, going over and over what he said. She can tell that this question is going to replace the last statement.

_Katniss will pick whoever she thinks she can't survive without._

_Catnip, if you _could_ survive without him, would you be here?_

Would she? She wonders this as they head back through the woods. What, exactly, is holding her here besides him? Not Haymitch, obviously. Not the fact that it was once her home, because District 12 did not feel like her home again until he moved into her house. Her house didn't feel like home until he moved into it. And now that it's clear that she's not _sentenced_ here, that this is actually a district again, that she could probably go anywhere she wants…why is she here? She doesn't need to be here.

She could make an argument for her woods, maybe. She tries for this as they wander back to Victor's Village.

"So, they're tearing the fence down?" she asks, her tone light, as if this is just small talk. But she catches the sideways glance he gives her, which contains all the unspoken things.

"Yeah. They told you that they want to use 12 as a place to plant food but they're thinking the Meadow…"

He hesitates, looks at her. She must look somewhat solid, somewhat sane, since he continues.

"They're thinking of using the Meadow to grow plants for medicines. They're hoping…hoping you might undertake the job. You know gathering, and then seeding…"

Her eyebrows shoot up. They want her to gather? Though she does like the idea of helping people, would love to help them plant for medicinal reasons because she hates suffering (even more so now than before) she's not sure she's the best person for the job. What if she has nightmares and can't go for a week? But then, she's never missed more than a few days hunting because of her nightmares. She'd just never thought that she'd be anyone's first choice for gathering. She's always been a hunter first. She's a gatherer only because she needed to be, remembered she _could_ be after she saw that dandelion that meant survival. The day after he gave her the bread. Dandelions make her feel hopeful because he _gave_ her hope in the first place. Damn, everything comes back to Peeta, doesn't it?

Gale is watching her, waiting for her reaction. She wonders what her face looks like, what he's thinking of her, and is relieved to find that she doesn't care.

"I'm already in the woods every day to hunt game for…for Greasy Sae," she mutters, avoiding Peeta's name. "It might be…I mean, I might be able to…to help with that. Maybe."

He nods as if her tentative assent is more than he hoped for. What it really is, of course, is her way of hoping that she can prove to Gale, to Peeta, to _herself_ that she's here for the woods, the Meadow, the lake, not him. Because she can survive without him. She can.

He's sitting in his studio, painting, when they come into the house.

"I'm in here," he calls to her unnecessarily, and she wonders why he isn't coming out to say hello to Gale when she remembers that Gale's tread is even lighter than hers.

"Did you eat? Because I'm not really hungry, and I was hoping you would let me paint you…" He trails off as he looks over his shoulder and sees that she's not alone. He's in the middle of painting a fall scene, with leaves and a dusky sky. There's the perfect combination of orange and green, their favorite colors, and she can see where she'd fit in the painting immediately. But he'll have to paint her later, after Gale's gone, because he's gotten to his feet. They're shaking hands, speaking, but she's distracted from their words by the sudden chill in the air. It's hostility; they still, after all this time, are competing. For what, she's not sure, since Katniss so clearly belongs to Peeta, and Gale's chosen Johanna anyways.

"I was going to roast the goose and bake potatoes," she tells him, holding up her game bag, "but if you're not hungry…"

There's an awkward pause. Neither of them are going to say a word. Gale looks strange, a bit sad. And Peeta's looking at her as if he's not quite sure who she is anymore.

"Have you seen Johanna?" she asks Peeta. He shakes his head, slowly. The way he's acting unnerves her: he's either angry or very, very, hurt. Likely both. And both of those emotions are often precursors to episodes. "I haven't seen anyone, really. I mean, Greasy Sae, obviously—"

"Johanna's talking with Haymitch," Gale explains. He's looking at her like he's not sure he made the right choice. But he has, he told her that. "I can go get her, if you want to have supper together…"

She's not sure why it's so awkward, not sane enough to piece together what Peeta's thinking. She nods assent to Gale.

"Get Haymitch to come too?" she requests as he's heading out. "You ate his breakfast this morning, you know."

He sticks his tongue out at her in response. She misses him, misses having a best friend. Peeta is her friend, but he's so much more than that and everything with him is so complicated. Gale uncomplicates things, simplifies entire life issues into one-line questions.

_If she could survive without him, would she be here? _

She's wary of him, of the way he's staring at her. What if he has an episode before they even get back? Haymitch will kill her. But he merely heads into the kitchen and starts washing potatoes. She joins him, wordlessly. She wants him to speak first. He does.

"What is he doing here?"

Peeta won't meet her eyes. She wants to assure him, that she's his, that if she belongs to anyone it's him, it's _always_ been him, but she can't say that. She knows she needs to comfort him, but she's so confused right now, so tied up in assuring herself that the answer to Gale's stupid question is…

"They…they're tearing down the fence around my woods," she explains. "Gale's been put in command of it."

Peeta nods, still working on the potatoes. She wants him to hold her, brushes past him and gets too close so that he'll give in. But he ignores her hand on his back as she moves around him. She figures words might be a better way to get through to him. But he's the one who's good with words, not her.

"They want to use my Meadow to grow plants and herbs for medicines," she tells him. He raises his eyebrows.

"Do you have the book or does your mother?" is all he asks.

"I do," she tells him, and now she's angry as she finishes skinning the goose. Who the hell does he think he is? It's not _her_ fault they're tearing down the fence or that Gale's here. Why is he mad at _her_?

She throws the goose into the pan with unnecessary vigor. The memory of plucking geese with Gale in 2 after Peeta tried to choke her comes into her mind: unwanted, terrible, but there anyways. Another example of Gale's infallible ability to assess her character so accurately. He'd told her that he could never compete with Peeta because of how much pain he'd been put through for her. Gale was right: he _could_ never compete with Peeta. She will never be able to let go of him. But it's not because of pain he's been put through, past or present (because really, Gale's hurting just as much). It's because…he's _Peeta_. He's her Boy with the Bread.

She sighs, knowing she has to say something before they get back, and knowing they'll be back soon. She goes to him, pulls him away from his potatoes gently, inexorably. She puts her face against his chest and feels his arms go around her. He smells like cinnamon from the bread he baked today. He holds her tightly, and she feels his chin on her hair. After a minute she speaks.

"Gale's with Johanna," she tries, but Peeta just snorts.

"If you're trying to comfort me, you might want a different tactic," he tells her. It's strange to hear him scathingly sarcastic like this. "I don't trust him. I don't care who he's with."

"Well, I trust him," she says. Probably not the tactic he was thinking of. "Isn't that enough?"

"No, frankly. It's not." Again, she hears the bitterness in his voice. She has no idea how to get rid of it. This is not _her_ Peeta: her boy with the bread would never speak like this no matter how upset. Hell, her boy with the bread didn't speak like this during the Games. This is the Capitol's doing, which means it's entirely up to her to undo it.

"He and Johanna have been on TV," she tries. Maybe gratitude will bring him back to himself. "So that we wouldn't have to be. They're doing it for us."

He snorts. "Who would want us on TV?" he asks, mirroring her thoughts as he so often does. She bites back the smile.

"Apparently, lots of people," she tells him. "They don't want to be doing it, but they're trying to help us."

He snorts, again. He doesn't believe her. It's a very strange sensation, to have him not believe her when she's telling the truth.

"Johanna's like my sister," is what he says. "We heard each other get tortured. She's always going to have my back after that."

"And Gale's like my brother—" she rushes to say, but he throws back his head and laughs at her. His laugh is all wrong: angry, poisonous. This is hijacked-Peeta, but he's not in an episode. He's just different; damaged irrevocably by the Capitol. She feels tears threatening, but she refuses to succumb to them.

"He is," she insists.

"Siblings don't kiss," is what he tells her, his voice hard. "Try again."

She sighs. She's out of all her tactics but one, and that's the truth. She doesn't want to tell him the truth, so close on the heels of her talk with Gale about need. She doesn't need him to survive. But…she needs to get rid of this hijacked-Peeta. Maybe even enough to confess to feelings she doesn't want him to know she has…

"Peeta. You don't have to be jealous, or nervous or…I chose you." He tilts her chin until she's looking right into his blue eyes. She loves that he has such amazing eyes, so different from hers. His are clear, beautiful; hers are murky and dark.

"After his bomb killed Prim," whispers Peeta, and she wonders how he knows that it was Gale's bomb until she realizes she must talk about it in her sleep. She doesn't want hijacked-Peeta talking about Prim. But when he speaks again, his voice is soft. It's probably Prim that brought him out of it. Her little sister could always bring out the best in people.

"I…you can't blame me for wondering if I'm just the runner-up. The Victor by default…again." She's so unaccustomed to him being insecure, and she holds him tighter. He was the Victor by default because he was the only one of them who was truly a good person.

"He's still your best friend," whispers Peeta. Brokenly, not angrily. He's come back to himself. She's feels warm relief spreading through her.

"He's always been your best friend."

She doesn't try to refute this, doesn't see the point.

"He's my best friend," she tells him, softly, "but you are not the runner-up. You're…I would've chosen you no matter what."

"I don't have any competition anywhere?" he asks, teasing her. She can tell he's trying to be light-hearted, but it doesn't reach his eyes. He still doesn't believe her.

"You don't," she insists, not sure how to make him see. "It's you I chose, you I want in my house, in my bed, in my life."

And then she realizes what will comfort him, what words he needs. He's needed them for a long time, and though she'll give them to him when he's sleeping, or just out of an episode, she's never said them to him when he's fully himself before. She gulps. She _needs_ to say this, but it will take away so much of her power.

As Johanna, Haymitch, and Gale bang into their house, filling it with the noise, making it less empty, he beats her to it. She marvels how perfectly he always follows her unspoken thoughts as he whispers, "We'll figure it out. I love you." He kisses her forehead, starts to let go, because in his wildest dreams he wouldn't expect her to respond. She feels the happiest smile taking over her face as she pulls him closer, kisses him quickly, and whispers, "I love you, too."

He looks like a different person when he smiles, but she's starting to think she does too.

**Reviews make me smile. **


	25. nightmares

**As always, you guys make my life a better place. Thanks for your awesomeness. **

**The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins, not to me, though I do enjoy playing with her characters.**

Dinner is the strangest combination of joy and agony she's ever experienced (which is probably saying a lot for someone who survived two Games). Haymitch brings two bottles of wine, one for himself and one for the rest of them to share. He's less drunk than usual, at least before he starts on the bottle. Johanna and Katniss keep up their usual banter. Katniss has forgotten how much she enjoys Johanna's presence, even if she drives her crazy. They're like sisters thrown together not because they want to be, but simply because they're family, for better and for worse. She likes having _these_ people here, likes the winks Johanna throws Gale, the way he'll tug on Katniss' braid as he always has, then look to Johanna as if to be sure it's okay. Haymitch's sarcastic comments fit in perfectly and Peeta's cooking is amazing. The only problem is the waves of hostile jealousy rolling between the only two men she's ever kissed (not including Chaff, of course). She keeps one hand firmly on Peeta's thigh but she's not sure it makes the slightest bit of difference. Finally, after an hour or so, they've gotten through Peeta's amazing cake and he still hasn't calmed down. He's stiff, which scares her, because he's so rarely still, unless he's mid-episode. The conversation dwindles somewhat, Peeta's silence finally filling the room. Haymitch gurgles through half a glass of wine before he looks up at Gale and Johanna.

"You done, then?" he asks sarcastically. Katniss glares at him.

"She's still got cake," she tells him, glaring, "and they're sleeping here anyways."

"Not what I was talking about, but thanks for the update, sweetheart," he slurs at her, sarcastic as always. She looks at the two of them, but they're avoiding her eyes.

"You figured out you're not going to butter him up, then, lover boy?" Haymitch shoots at Gale. Peeta's fork falls to the floor as he spasms violently, his head falling between his legs, hands underneath his knees. He's shaking.

"Hey," she whispers, taking his face in her hands. "He's not talking to you. He's not talking to you. It's okay. You're okay." He nods, shudders as she smoothes her hand over his cheek.

"What the hell?" demands Haymitch.

"The Careers called him that in the arena," she spits at him, "which you I'm sure you noticed, being our mentor and all. Must've slipped your mind." She reaches across the table and pulls his bottle of wine away, emptying it in her glass. He starts to protest, but is cut off by her angry words.

"What the hell are you talking about?" She looks first at Gale, then at Johanna, then finally turns her gaze back to Haymitch. He sighs.

"They want you two to make an appearance in the Capitol."

"Hell no," they respond, immediately, in unison. She almost smiles, because it's only the second time she's heard him swear, but then the reality of what was just said sinks in on her. Instead of tearing her fingernails down Haymitch's face again, she turns her anger on Gale.

"We spend the entire day together. You didn't think you needed to mention this?" He avoids her eyes.

"I needed to wait, Catnip," he mutters. "They don't want just you…they want…" He's stuttering, and she can see he doesn't want to reveal what they talked about. She's glad: it was private, between the two of them. She has very few secrets from Peeta, but one of them is undoubtedly that she was awake during that conversation in the Capitol. _If she could survive without him, would she be here?_

"They need us both," Peeta fills in. He's sitting up again, his face red but he's calm. He takes a swig of her wine before saying, "They don't just want the Mockingjay. They need their star-crossed lovers again."

She's off her feet before she knows what's happening, barely makes it to the sink before her dinner comes back up. She's retching, coughing, and then the only hands she could possibly want are there, pulling her hair back from her face. Of course they don't just want her, their Mockingjay: they need them both. She couldn't even be the Mockingjay without him. But she's not sure she's strong enough, sane enough, to do this, even with him. She turns around, lays her forehead against his chest. "Shh," he whispers, soothing. He fills every role for her, but that of comforter might be her favorite.

"We're not going," he tells her and she sighs relief into his chest.

"Yes, you are, brainless," mutters Johanna. "They need you."

"We're all going," Haymitch jumps in. "All the Victors. But they…they need to see you two, whole and happy."

"We're neither of those things," mutters Katniss, not lifting her face from his shirt.

She feels him chuckle silently. He leans down to whisper in her ear. "You were pretty happy last night," he whispers, and she blushes. Then again, maybe lover is her favorite role.

Johanna clicks her tongue impatiently. "That's all people need to see," she bursts out. "You two all over each other, having sex on the kitchen table—"

"Haymitch!" they protest in unison, spinning around to face him. Peeta's hand is still on her waist, but now that her face isn't buried in him anymore, she can see Gale's shocked expression, Haymitch's smirk. Also that he's stolen her wine.

"Give me that!" she demands, striding across the room. She pulls it from him and drinks it down in one swallow.

"Nice, sweetheart," he laughs. "I don't see what the big deal is. You're together now, for yourselves, not for any cameras or rebellion. You're so in love it's disgusting, so why can't you dress up nice for one night and show everyone that the love they were rooting for all along was, well…real?"

Her head is spinning from the wine, but she feels like there may be a thread of logic somewhere in his words.

"Hmmm…what _is _the big deal?" asks Peeta, and she's so unused to hearing him sarcastic that he pulls her out of her reverie. "Well, let's start with the fact that they tried to kill us."

"Join the club," mutters Haymitch.

"Multiple times," adds Peeta.

"Yeah, what else you got?" asks Johanna, who's twirling her wine around.

"They took our sanity. They lit us on fire. They threatened us with death and then delivered much worse. They tortured you while I was in the next room. They tortured me while you were in the next room. They ate until they were sick while we starved to death. They killed children, for years." Peeta rattles these off so quickly, so matter-of-fact that she wonders how long he's been compiling this list in his head. But he still hasn't hit on the most important point.

"They tried to take you from me," she whispers, and her eyes lock on Peeta's. "They still take you sometimes. They tried to separate us." He smiles, and she sees that compared to this, his list of complaints isn't real, not real, because this is what matters most to him too.

"So, no, we're not going," she informs Johanna, Gale, and Haymitch. Three of the only people she still trusts, and now she's not sure what to do with that. Is Peeta the only one she can trust?

"They are what made us hopeless," she says, "and I'll have no part in building that hope back up again."  
And then she's gone, up the stairs and into their bedroom, and she knows she should be crying, but she merely undresses and slides, numb, underneath the covers to wait for the only person who can make her feel hope.

* * *

_She's in the Capitol. She's not sure where, but she knows she needs to get out. It smells like roses, looks like a pastel-colored hell. She is terrified, doesn't have a Holo, has no idea which way to turn. It feels like every path will lead her to Snow. She doesn't know where Peeta is. She can see Gale ahead of her and she knows, instinctively that Boggs is behind her, Finnick nearby. There's a terrible sound, like an explosion from parachutes, and they hit the ground. She feels blood on her face, and then, she feels the worst feeling of all: fire. It's licking up her spine, and she knows it will surround her, kill everyone, kill _Prim_…She rolls over, writhing on the ground to put the fire out, screaming to the others to go: Prim, Gale, Finnick, Boggs…And then she's transfixed by what's going on above her. Through the ashes of the dead that are pouring down, she sees Peeta. He's covered in blood and carrying a gun, and her reaction is not love or joy but pure fear. He's not going to shoot her (they only gave him blanks, didn't they? Was that real?) but he's holding the butt of the gun like a weapon. And then he's above her, and he's aiming for her head. She rolls around more, screaming, because someone needs to stop him, he's going to kill her, and she sees Gale. She screams for him but he doesn't try to stop Peeta, he just picks up Johanna and runs for somewhere safer. They're sorry excuses for hunters and friends (she thought that before, real or not real?). And now Peeta's become a puppet, and she sees Snow above him through the ashes, manipulating the strings that are moving his arms and legs, and he's trying to kill her, she's not rolling fast enough…but what Snow can't control is his face, and that's what scares her most. This is not her Peeta: this is a hijacked maniac, trying to kill her because he hates her, he doesn't need her, he thinks she's not even human…She rolls for cover and finds herself instead face to face with Boggs, mutilated almost beyond recognition, with no legs, ashes everywhere. He pulls her close, looks into her eyes, and tells her something she knows she's heard before: "Kill Peeta." And then it repeats like a mantra, over and over until she's screaming as loud as she can, but she can't drown it out: Kill Peeta. Kill Peeta. Kill Peeta. Kill Peeta…_

"Katniss!" She awakes with a start, her throat raw, and she knows she was screaming like she hasn't in months. She's aware that she's in her own bed, that she's safe, but she doesn't believe it. She can't stop screaming, thrashing—

"Katniss, you're safe. It's me. Look at me." But those perfect blue eyes are not going to calm her because he's the one who was trying to hurt her, and so she moves away, pushes him off, curls into a ball.

"I don't know," she whispers. "I don't know, I don't know what to…" She takes a calming breath. "My name is Katniss Everdeen. I live in District 12. I'm in love with Peeta Mellark. He tried to kill me. I was told to kill him. I was told to—" She stops, looks at him. He's sitting at the edge of the bed, not wavering in the face of her insanity.

"Boggs told me to kill you. Real or not real?" He hesitates. "Real, I think. I'm not sure. But probably real."

"You were there," she insists. "Didn't you hear him?"

"No, because I wasn't listening, but when he transferred the Holo to you—"

"He said, 'Don't trust them. Don't go back. Kill Peeta. Do what you came to do.' Real or not real?"

"Real," says Peeta, though she knows he didn't hear it. "And you did. You killed Snow, you—" And then she's sobbing again, pushing herself into the headboard, as far away from him as possible.

"No, I didn't kill you, I didn't, I didn't, I—" His arms are around her, comforting her, and she wants to pull away because she destroys_ everything_ but she can't. He's rubbing her back, pressing kisses to her forehead and her temple.

"You didn't," he tells her. "I'm right here. I'm safe. I'm alive. I love you." He repeats it over and over again, until eventually she begins to take in the truth behind his words: he's right here. He's safe. He's alive. He loves her. She clings to him, holds him tight so no one can take him. She starts breathing again, starts to feel the sheen of sweat on her body, how her heart rate is coming down.

"Can I go get some water?" she asks, quietly, and he nods, stroking her hair.

"They're still here," he tells her. "I can bring some up for you if you'd rather…"

"No," she says, shaking her head, getting to her shaky feet, "I'm okay. I can see them. I'm okay."

They descend the stairs slowly, because she's still shaky on her feet. She's grateful that Haymitch, Gale, and Johanna aren't pretending to talk or pretending that they didn't hear her. She's come to appreciate honesty.

"Catnip?" Gale asks as she sits next to him. Peeta gets her water and sits on her other side. She drinks it slowly.

"Boggs told me to kill him. Real or not real?" The question's directed at Gale, the only other person who was there.

"Real, I think," he says. "Real." She nods, slowly, letting the water calm her. Now Peeta's hand is on her leg under the table.

"I still can't believe I didn't get to be there for that," mutters Johanna. Katniss stares at her in disbelief but Gale smirks.

"Yeah, like I've been telling you, it was good times. Pretty much like running through a field of daisies," he tells her and the way he smiles at her scowl makes it clear they've had this argument before.

Peeta's looking awkward, like he's not sure whether or not to let them all sit around in awkward silence. Katniss looks at him, eyebrows raised.

"I was going to get some of my paintings to show them before you…" he trails off, not sure how to phrase it.

"Started screaming your head off like a lunatic," fill in Haymitch and Johanna in unison. They grin at each other. She rolls her eyes.

"Is Boggs in any of them?" she asks, and he shakes his head. "Go for it, then." He nods and leaves, heading to his studio and they hear him bumping around.

"How often does that happen?" asks Haymitch, tipping back a drink Peeta must have given him. He's trying to sound unconcerned but not quite making it. She wonders when he lost his unrivalled ability to feign indifference.

"It hasn't been that bad in months," she tells him, forcing herself to meet Gale's eyes too, so he'll know she's telling the truth. "He's usually with me, not entertaining people while I go to bed alone."

"No one made you leave, moron," Johanna tells her, rolling her eyes.

"It's what she does when things get tough," supplies Gale. "She just leaves." Katniss nods.

"I did it all the time in 13," she explains to Johanna. Haymitch is smirking again, but maybe he's just drunk. "It made Coin question her decision to rescue me instead of Peeta."

They laugh, appreciatively, and in the silence that follows, as the other three sip their drinks and think about Coin, Katniss realizes that Peeta is far too quiet.

**Reviews make me smile. **


	26. victors

**I'm so sorry for the cliffy! I've been super sick the last few days (which is why you're getting updated even faster than usual: I actually don't have a life right now!). And in my drugged-up state, I remember thinking, "Hmm. Is that a cliffy? Should I cut it off somewhere else…nah. It's fine." And just going for it. I'm sorry! I'm on far less meds for this chapter, I promise. Thanks for reviewing and reading even though I went all loopy on you. You guys rock! **

**The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins, not to me, though I do enjoy playing with her characters.**

She throws her glass down and runs into the studio, her worst suspicions confirmed: Peeta, on the ground, fist in his mouth, rage in his eyes. She's slipped onto the ground beside him and touched his shoulder before she realizes that she should be more careful, that Haymitch will be over-protective, that Gale and Johanna are surely following her.

She's pissed at Gale anyways, because of what he said about her leaving when things get tough, because if that were true, she wouldn't still be here. He's the one who questioned her motives for being here. Shit—none of this is going to end well with Gale in the room, is it? By the time she realizes the repercussions of her actions it's too late, she's already underneath him and none of it matters anyways. He's touching her throat with a purpose this time, as if he's trying to memorize exactly what it looks like. It takes longer than usual for him to look at her, into her eyes, and see that she's really there, not just a hallucination or a ghost.

"I tried to kill you, real or not real?"

"Real."

"I tried to smash your skull in with a gun."

"Real."

"And Boggs told you to kill me."

"Real," she whispers, tears choking off her voice. Why is he bringing this up so quickly on the heels of her nightmare? Unless it's her nightmare that set him off…

"District 12 was burned to the ground."

"Real, but we're here now, we're rebuilding it—"

"My family died in that fire and it was all my fault!"

He's upset, tears threatening, but she puts her hand on his face and he calms, somewhat.

"_Not_ real. The fire was the Capitol's fault, not yours."

"And not your fault?" he asks, confused. "You killed my family, Snow told me—"

"Snow is a liar, and he's dead."

"But you killed my family—"

"No, Peeta, not real. The Capitol killed your family. Snow killed your family."

"And Haymitch was helping Snow." That's the first time she's heard that one.

"Not real. Haymitch was helping us."

"But he rescued you, not me. He didn't rescue me. If he was helping us, why didn't he rescue me?"

She's crying in earnest now, because she doesn't want to tell him the truth.

"He rescued _me_, but we rescued you, Peeta."

"Gale rescued me."

"Real."  
"You're in love with him."

"_Not _real. I'm in love with you."

"No, no, I'm not…that's not…you love me?"

"Yes. Real."

"But Snow said you—"  
"Not real, Peeta. Whatever Snow said is not real."

"I heard Johanna screaming. They electrocuted her, soaked her in water and cut her as much as they could so that the blood mixed with the water, rusty water, and when the shocks started she screamed—"

Katniss hears a strangled sob from above them, so she cuts him off.

"Yes, Peeta, that's real."

"Real?" he confirms. He's so confused.

"Yes, that's real. It's not shiny, right? Remember, if it's not shiny, it's probably real."

"You said that? Before?"

"Real."

"And I said that if I could grow wings, I could fly. But people can't grow wings?"

She's smiling, despite the horror the memory.

"Real. People don't need wings. Only Mockingjays do."

And then it's over, he's collapsed, and she strokes his hair, looking up to see Johanna sobbing into Gale's chest and Haymitch staring at Katniss and Peeta as if they're the most lost little children he's ever had the misfortune to know.

Haymitch makes his sentiments known the moment they're sitting at the kitchen table, after Katniss has poured tea for all five of them. Johanna's calmed somewhat but Peeta is still shaking.

"I don't know which of you I think is more dim-witted," says Haymitch conversationally. "You, to put up with her screaming or you, to put up with his…what'd you call them? Oh, episodes." She glares at him, feels Gale's eyes on her.

"Our Mockingjay's stupider, definitely," says Johanna, and it feels like it might be an attempt at a joke, but she doesn't think it's funny. Peeta sighs, rolling his eyes at Johanna. He clearly disagrees.

"I thought you said his episodes were better," Gale tells her, his voice deadly. She shrugs.

"I did. They are. They still happen."

She knows she should stop there, let it go, but frankly, he hasn't earned that yet. He might never earn that from her. She feels her anger welling up as she says, "Don't pretend I'm the one who was lying in the woods today, when you just wanted to lure me to the Capitol all along."

Gale's on his feet and in an instant, so is Peeta. It's such a predictable scene: Gale, on fire for something he's passionate about, Peeta, desperate to protect her. _That's what you and I do, we protect each other_.

"You sure you're safe to be around her?" Gale spits at him, and she wonders briefly why he's mad at Peeta. Whatever she might have said, she's the one who lied to him. Not that he doesn't deserve it but…

"I'd say we're well-suited to being around each other," Peeta tells him carefully. "We're still healing. The Capitol tried to destroy us, and we're building each other back up."

Gale snorts. Johanna's watching him carefully, no doubt ready to spring into action if necessary. Katniss feels like she's still in a nightmare; like what she does won't affect what's going on either way. Is she still dreaming?

"So, how are you building her back up, exactly? What makes you think that it's your job to do that? How far are you going to let your episodes go before you—"

"They're getting better, I already told you," Katniss snaps, glaring at him. Peeta puts his hand on her shoulder.

"If you're this upset, how come you didn't make a fuss about us living together?" asks Peeta.

Gale's jaw tightens and the next second, he's slamming his fist into Peeta's face.

Katniss shrieks, on her feet, out of control, not sure whether she should hit Gale or comfort Peeta. Johanna seems to have Gale under control, is pushing him backwards, calming the storm that's still raging in his eyes. She drops to her knees beside Peeta, who's holding his jaw.

"Ouch," he mutters, and then pulls her to him.

"Are you okay?" he asks. She's confused, pulls his hand away from his jaw to see it red and already swelling.

"That's my question," she whispers, and he pulls her close, kisses her temple. She stands, pulls him to his feet, goes to get him some ice. Gale has calmed under Johanna's less than gentle touch, and now she sees that they are good together, fire with fire.

"Sorry," mutters Gale as Peeta takes the ice wrapped in a towel Katniss hands him. "I just—I didn't know you two were living together and—"

"I'd probably punch me too," Peeta mutters, and Katniss is probably the only one who discerns that this is a far cry from forgiveness or even acceptance. Gale smiles, and then they're all laughing, albeit awkwardly. Katniss looks at Johanna with pride.

"You two _are _good for each other," she tells Gale. "I didn't teach you to apologize in 6 years, and she's done it in, what? Six months?" Gale rolls his eyes and gets straight to the point, but his lack of violence surprises her.

"You two are living together?" he asks, directing the question at her. She nods.

"Why the hell wouldn't you tell me this when we were talking about…" He trails off, obviously aware that their conversation was private, that he said things she wouldn't want Peeta to hear. (He did: If she could survive without him, would she be here?_)_

"I didn't…I didn't know how you'd react," she mutters, face red, not looking at him. "I thought you'd freak out."

"Yeah, you thought pretty accurately," Peeta mutters, and she looks at him, at the ice on his jaw, and smiles. How is he the one making jokes in this situation?

Gale smirks at this. "You think I overreacted?" he asks Peeta, challenging.

"Calm down," Johanna tells him. "Of course they're living together, they're the most disgusting in love people I've ever met. Your cousin's safe and sound, don't you worry." Peeta laughs at the "cousin" remark and even Gale softens a little.

"Is she safe and sound? You don't ever try to hurt her during your…"

"Episodes," supplies Peeta. "Never." She nods in agreement.

"But you're still having them," challenges Gale, not quite ready to let go. Katniss loses her patience. She supposed she should be more patient with Gale, but then, he just punched Peeta, and she was never the patient one to begin with.

"And I'm still having nightmares and Haymitch is still drunk and you're still punching people," she bursts out, causing Haymitch to bark a laugh. "We've all got scars from the Capitol. Mine match his. Now drop it."

Peeta's nodding. "She's the only one who can pull me out of them," he agrees, looking at the scar on his hand (her messy stitches gave him one more thing to look back on, one more pain he can never completely forget).

"And he's the only one who can pull her out of her nightmares," supplies Johanna. She's so firmly on their side that it makes Katniss feel like she really _is_ her sister, like she's defending them the way Prim would have.

"Yeah, he is," she agrees. Haymitch blows out a breath in frustration.

"That's all you have to say," he tells them, exasperated. "Just come to the Capitol, let them brush your hair for the first time since the rebellion—" (This earns a glare from her, but he isn't as far off as he might think) "—and tell them how in love you are, how you're still healing but you're using each other to heal."

She sighs, takes his bottle and replaces her tea with his liquor. "I'm still gonna be the crazy girl who killed the wrong president," she mutters. The kitchen erupts into laughter; even she manages a small smile.

"Coin killed your sister," Gale reminds her (as if she needs reminding). "You were provoked."

"Oh, great, so I get to kill everyone who killed someone I knew? We'd have a much smaller population then," she reminds him, and Haymitch laughs again. Johanna and Peeta are silent, probably considering the truth of this. Katniss is thinking that if she followed through on Gale's logic, she'd get to kill him, wouldn't she? She's confused, clings to Peeta's hand.

"No one's mad at you anymore," tries Johanna feebly. Gale raises his eyebrows. "Okay, people are pissed, but everyone gets it. Coin was out of line, sending Prim into battle like that. She was doing it to break you."

"Yeah? Well it worked," Katniss reminds them. They all shake their heads, but it's Peeta who speaks.

"No, it didn't," he says softly. "You're still here, whole and healthy. You have overcome all of Snow's torture, the rebellion, Coin's last attempt to break you by trying to have me kill you and then killing Prim. And here you are, whole and relatively happy."

He raises his eyebrows as if he's questioning the last one and she blushes, nods. She is whole, mostly sane, relatively happy. Is that all they can hope for, anymore?

"What about you?" she asks. "You made it through, too. You're the one Snow hijacked…"

But now she's confused, because she can't remember which of them that was supposed to hurt more. It was meant to separate them, turn them back into children. But they're not children, they're victors. All victors start as children though, don't they? They haven't been children for a long time. But looking at Johanna, who has lost so much of her light happiness, her bravado, no matter how good a show she is able to put on, makes Katniss think of another Victor yanked away from childhood far sooner than he should have been. And she feels tears threatening as she relives the memory, so she just asks. They told Peeta to ask what was real or not real when he was insane, so why the hell shouldn't she?

"Finnick told us that whatever happened in the past was in the past. And that no one in the Quell was a victor by chance…except maybe Peeta."

Peeta grins, but sobers up as he sees her tears. Johanna is staring like she can't quite believe Katniss had the gall to bring that up. But Katniss is learning, slowly but surely, the wisdom in those words, the wisdom in a lot of what Finnick said. Because whatever happened in the past _is_ in the past, whether it be Victors holding hands at interviews or Gale volunteering for the Games that killed Prim. That doesn't mean there aren't scars, doesn't make mean they tossed their weapons in the sea, doesn't mean she forgives him. It just means it's in the past.

Everyone has paused, waiting. She glares at Haymitch and is rewarded with an answer to the question she didn't ask.

"Real," Haymitch tells her.

"But now that's us. We're not children, not anymore, and we're not here by chance," she says, and she sees them nodding.

"Not even me," says Peeta, and she smiles.

"They really want us?" she asks, though the question feels wrong, sounds stupid. Of course they do. They want all their hopes confirmed. Can she confirm them?

"I mean…they want us, their star-crossed lovers? That's what's going to bring back their hope, confirm that what they did was right?" Haymitch nods, starts to speak, but he's cut off by Peeta's chuckle.

"When are you going to realize the effect you have?" he asks her, touching her cheek. She blushes.

"No one knows what to do with you," agrees Gale, echoing Tigris. He and Peeta look at each other, laugh, and suddenly they're friends, as they were that night. Then, Gale sighs as he looks across the table at Peeta.

"We probably shouldn't stay here, should we?" he asks. "I didn't realize you lived here. We'll set you off. We can find somewhere else."  
She feels his grip on her hand tense, but Peeta shakes his head.

"You can stay here," he says, and though the delivery leaves a little to be desired, Johanna and Katniss both stare at him in shock. They _will_ set him off: they already have. The fact that he's willing to have them here shows how much stronger he is, probably stronger than all of them put together. If Peeta were in her shoes, he could forgive Gale, probably already would have.

Peeta grins. "We wouldn't subject you to staying at Haymitch's," he teases, and their mentor makes a face at him as the boys laugh.

It's this, more than anything, that makes her mind up. The fact that they can make peace, after all that's happened, after bombs have been dropped and choices have been made that can't be unmade.

"Peeta?" she asks, and he looks at her, looks into her eyes. No one sees her the way he does. He's followed her thoughts perfectly, and she asks herself, for the millionth time, if she really could survive without him, if she were tested. Would she be here if she could?

He nods, takes her hand.

"We'll go," he confirms, and there's a contented sigh around the table.

**Reviews make me smile. **


	27. laughing

**Hello lovelies! As always, thank you for your marvelous reviews (and the favorite-ing). You make my smile so big! **

**So, the end of this chapter gets a bit lemony. I think I'm still ok with a T-rating (it's far from explicit), but if you're sensitive to that, stop reading at the page break. I guarantee you'll miss nothing plot-wise. **

**The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins, not to me, though I do enjoy playing with her characters.**

They're leaving tomorrow, less than a week after Johanna and Gale arrived. At first she questioned the quick schedule, but then she realized that no one expected it to be a long conversation. They'd either say yes or no, and that would be that. She still isn't sure, as she throws their clothes into a suitcase, that they said the right thing. But they did. A Capitol full of Victors telling their stories, their _real_ stories, not lying for the camera, is heartening. This is the hope that stirs in a world with no Games. Maybe this will be the one that sticks; isn't that what she's supposed to be hoping for?

But she has one more trial to get through: today they're pulling the fence down around her woods. She doesn't know how she feels about that. Just because she's gotten used to the idea doesn't mean she wants it. She wishes she'd been allowed to keep one thing: either stay here, watch the rest of them on TV and lose her woods or go to the Capitol and keep her woods. It seems unfair, asking her to give up both.

She and Gale went to say good-bye this morning: sat and ate blackberries and Peeta's bread at their old spot, wandered all the way down to the lake, said good-bye to big moments, like the time they caught their first buck, and smaller ones, like when she learned a knot for a certain snare, when she'd dug up katniss roots for the first time. Then she sits by the fence, watches as he shouts orders that are followed without hesitation. He's powerful, she realizes. He always has been, but to see it realized, to see his orders actually followed…this is the kind of change a rebellion brings.

After five minutes, she can't stand it anymore, so she leaves, without a word to Gale or anyone else. Maybe she does just leave when things get tough. She goes to find Peeta in town, where he and Greasy Sae have just moved their shop from her house to where the old bakery was, the new building much bigger. It's her first foray into town since she met Thom. She hates being there, still feels like she can smell the decaying bodies, the roses, the ashes, the ghosts...

He's not there, anyways. Instead she finds Johanna.

"What are you doing here?" she demands. Johanna smirks.

"Sent your boy home to drink with Haymitch. He was shaking like a leaf. I finished the ledger for him."

Katniss nods. "He didn't have an episode, did he?" Johanna shakes her head.

"Nah. Just started messing up all the orders." Something in Johanna's tone makes Katniss furious.

"He does an amazing job with those orders, considering he never finished school," she snaps at Johanna. The older girl's eyebrows go up.

"Never said he didn't," she muttered. "And I didn't finish school either, brainless. None of us did. Victors don't finish school."

Katniss shrugs, sits down on the steps that lead to the bakery. She can hear Greasy Sae singing, probably to her granddaughter, as Johanna sinks down beside her.

"So, we gonna talk about this or what?" Katniss wants to object at the idea that there's anything to talk about, but truly, she feels like hiding from Johanna is pointless. It takes energy to hide from people, and this girl can see through her so well that it's like carrying an extra backpack around the arena. Energy she can't afford to waste.

"Sure," Katniss mutters, grabbing a stick and drawing senseless patterns in the dirt with it. "What'd you wanna talk about?"

Johanna rolls her eyes. Sometimes it feels like they're competing for the most sarcastic girl in Panem award. Katniss is pretty confident she'd win if she _really _tried. (Good thing she and Prim never competed for anything, because this is exhausting).

"About freaking butterflies, moron," sighs Johanna, rolling her eyes and holding out a bag to Katniss. It has pastries in it. She takes one, Johanna takes one, and they sit in silence for a while. In a thoroughly unexpected way, Katniss misses her.

"He's not really here for the fence, is he?" she finally asks. Johanna rolls her eyes. "Haymitch told me you were smarter than you look. Why the hell are you asking that?"

"What are _you_ even doing here?" Katniss bursts out suddenly. Damn, she'd meant to work her way up to that question. Oh, well. Too late now. Johanna is quiet for a long time.

"I love him," she whispers, looking at Katniss, stricken. "I don't want to. I don't like it. It's…it makes me feel weak, needing him." (A feeling Katniss knows all too well, though she's stayed away from the needing part. But love makes her feel weak.)  
"But…he's the only one who makes me feel like I'm not dealing with all this alone. So it's worth it." Katniss nods.

"What are _you_ doing here?" Johanna mimics, sucking back another pastry.

"Same reason you are, brainless," she sighs. "He even makes me…happy….sometimes." Johanna nods.

"I never thought we, of all people, were actually gonna fall in love," she muses. "Not messed up star-crossed lovers faking, and not just sex to fill a void," (Katniss barely represses a shudder at that: has this girl never heard of over-sharing?) "but love. And the kid…" She trails off, and Katniss can see that her thoughts are far away in a Capitol dungeon.

"They were awful to him," Katniss whispers. Johanna looks like she wants to be sarcastic, but she just nods.

"They were mostly trying to mess with you," she mutters.

"It worked. Being separated from him…not just then, but during his episodes? It's the hardest thing I've ever had to deal with." She hadn't realized it until she said it aloud, but now that she has it's undeniably true.

"Yeah, from what I hear, you and gorgeous had it pretty easy before that." Ah, there's the sarcasm she was looking for.

Katniss just shrugs.

"Did you love him?"

The way Johanna asks makes it sound as if the question were ripped from her against her will. She probably only wants to know the answer if it's the answer she wants. But Katniss has come to value honesty, so she thinks about it. She probably did, but everything was so confusing…every time she even kissed Gale there was either pain or violence involved. Usually both, like after his whipping.

"I don't know," she mutters finally. "I don't anymore."

"Not what I asked," Johanna reminds her. "But thanks for that."

"I…everything is so mixed up. I didn't before the arena. And after…" Katniss sighs. Johanna seems to take this as confirmation: that she did, that a part of her still does, always will. Katniss doesn't bother to argue with her. She doesn't want to say Prim's name aloud.

"Haymitch thinks we have more in common than we're willing to admit."

"We don't have anything in common," Katniss snaps immediately, further put out by Johanna throwing back her head in laughter.

"That's what I told him," she smiles, getting off the porch. "C'mon, let's go find lover boy."

"Don't call him that when he's in the room," Katniss warns as she takes Johanna's hand, is pulled to her feet. Johanna rolls her eyes.

"Yeah, thanks for the memo. I'd completely forgotten the way he almost stabbed himself in the leg with a fork the other night."

In spite of herself, the younger girl smiles.

They find him on Haymitch's porch. He's made them bread. They're drinking, eating the bread and laughing, about what she's not sure. He stands when he sees her, holding her for a moment, pressing a kiss to her forehead before he slices her some bread and pours her a drink. She eyes it cautiously.

"Bit early, isn't it?" she asks. Haymitch laughs, Johanna makes a comment, but she doesn't hear her because she isn't asking them. Peeta shrugs. He's made tea, too, is pouring her some carefully.

"Big day, isn't it?" he counters. She nods, ignores the tea, and takes the drink, swallowing it in one go, letting it burn its way down her throat. _They took away her woods today_.

"Not for you," she mutters, but she settles into the chair next to him, takes the bread he offers her.

"When are you going to figure out that you can't separate him from you?" Haymitch demands. He's wasted.

"Whatever," she mutters. "_I'm_ the one losing my woods. What the hell's wrong with the rest of you?" Johanna sniggers, pours herself a drink.

"We're all heading to the Capitol tomorrow, in case it slipped your mind," she drawls out sarcastically.

"Oh, yeah, I was distracted by the butterflies," she mutters, quietly, hoping it won't quite reach Haymitch. It does, of course. She cuts off his sarcastic remark by flicking her bread knife at him. It sticks in the arm of his chair. Admittedly an overreaction, but she's having a rough day. Peeta rolls his eyes.

"You were laughing when I walked up," she reminds them, trying to pull attention away from what she doesn't want to think about. She has to share her woods now. She can't pretend she's here for the familiar surroundings, because they don't belong to her anymore. If she could survive without him, would she be here?

Peeta looks sheepish. "We were talking about the Quell," he admits. She looks at him sharply, suddenly understands the alcohol.

"Why?" she demands, angry.

"We were talking about when Johanna had your back and saved Nuts and Volts," Haymitch explains.

"And how Finnick had to give her a bit of…persuasion to be…nice to you," finishes Peeta in his careful way. And now she laughs with them, taking her next drink gratefully.

"You were never nice to me," she counters, "not until I was letting you take my morphling."

"Thanks for that, by the way," says Johanna, toasting her. She smirks.

"I never had an older sister," she explains, "and I've always wondered what it would be like to have a sister that really hated you. I thought I'd test my theories on you."

They all laugh at this, and suddenly she's glad, that they're taking joy in things that were never joyful. She's not sure what happens after that, not sure how much time passes because she still has trouble following conversations that aren't with Peeta, but she does know that by the time Gale shows up on the porch, they're all unquestionably drunk.

"What the hell are you doing?" he demands, which causes them all the collapse into giggles.

"Hey, you're not supposed to be here!" exclaims Peeta. "Hunger Games Victors only, don't ya know?"

This causes the other three to giggle, but Katniss pulls herself together enough to say, "Oh, let him stay. He did survive the 76th Hunger Games."

Gale chuckles; their mood must be infectious. He takes the drink and the bread that Peeta gives him, somewhat grudgingly.

"Shouldn't count," declares Johanna, though she's thrown her legs over him, clearly intending to keep him there. "That was just running through a field of daises, right, gorgeous?" He laughs, tipping back his drink. He sips alcohol, Katniss notes, not the way she and Peeta gulp theirs, hoping to get rid of their demons.

"How's my field of daises?" she asks, hoping she's not so drunk that she doesn't make sense. He smiles at her.

"They're going to take care of it," he promises, "and it's not like you won't still have the best game."

"Whatever," she mutters, finishing her glass, hoping to drown out the sorrow she feels at this before she has to make the trip to the place of her nightmares.

They talk about things that seem to span every topic in the world: drinking, the Quell, the cave Peeta and Katniss were in during the first Games, Johanna's habit of taking her clothes of, how Haymitch always sleeps with a knife. It seems to her that the more alcohol they consume, the more open they are, the more willing to share details they never would talk about sober. Peeta gets up multiple times to get more bread, so that by the time the sun sets, they've all had nothing but bread and liquor all day. They head inside to go to bed, though no one's the least bit tired.

"Tomorrow's going to be a big, big, big day!" Katniss chirps at Haymitch as they teeter off. He moves to slap her but misses, falling into one of his deck chairs. They laugh as Peeta hauls him onto his shoulder in a much-practiced gesture.

"I'll be right there," he tells Katniss, and she nods. She bids Gale and Johanna goodnight and heads to her bedroom. Peeta's there soon enough, pulling off his clothes and crawling in beside her.

* * *

"Did you put him to bed with his knife?" she asks, though it's slurred. Peeta can always understand her, though. He's the only one who always understands.

"Always," he mutters, and now his hands are on her under the covers. "If I don't piss him off, he'll send me more parachutes."

She giggles, wants to remind him that Haymitch never sent him parachutes, only her, but then his lips are on her stomach and her mind isn't really focused on anything but how he makes her feel.

She'd wondered if he was still jealous of Gale, but that night she knows it. She puts both hands over her mouth to cover the sounds she's making, the sounds he's bringing out of her, but when he pushes her hands firmly into the bed, bringing louder noises out of her that she's never made before and that she can't cover up, she knows he wants Gale to hear, to know that she belongs to Peeta, always has.

When it's over and they roll apart, gasping, she can't help it. She turns to face him, trying to lower the pitch of her voice so it mimics his.

"You are so hot when you're jealous," she drawls, smirking at him.

He rolls his eyes and tickles her until she takes it back.

**Reviews make me smile. **


	28. interviews

**Hello lovelies! As always, thank you for your marvelous reviews (and the favorite-ing). I feel compelled to warn you that we're nearing the end: I'm pretty sure the next chapter is the last. All of you guys have made this so much better than I ever thought it would be. Thank you! **

**The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins, not to me, though I do enjoy playing with her characters.**

They're absolutely miserable from the moment they arrive in the Capitol. In fact, Katniss is most excited to see her prep team, which is saying a lot. They fawn over her, complaining about her eyebrows, excited that because of the burns and the skin grafts, she can no longer grow hair on her legs, oohing over her long hair, which she has barely touched since she last saw them. They don't ask how she's doing mentally; aren't quite there enough yet to know how to ask those kind of questions—though the Capitol has changed, the vanity of its citizens is still very distinct from that of any other district. She finds their talk soothing, to an extent, because she doesn't have to say much, and it's such easy talk to follow that even she isn't confused. Maybe the secret to regaining social skills isn't to hide in the woods, it's only to have conversations that aren't about anything complicated or important. She'll have to ask Peeta about that later.

They have public appearances, interviews to an extent, before there is a great feast. She's mostly looking forward to the food, though it is something of a spectacle to see Caesar Flickerman onstage again, looking as if he hasn't aged at all, his wig a slightly more tasteful orange than his usual flamboyant choices. How the hell did he survive when Finnick Odair died?

She wants to see Peeta, but they're being separate so as to make a spectacle when they see each other onstage, similar to the one they made when they reunited after their first Games. Since they're last (the star-crossed lovers are _everyone's_ grand finale), she gets to watch the interviews of other Victors as her prep team does her hair and make-up. She tunes them out as Haymitch takes his place. He's first. He can't be the oldest surviving Victor, can he? She feels a surge of affection as she sees he's in a red bow tie, like the one Cinna put him in after the first Games. She wonders who got him into it today, but knows it really couldn't have been anyone but Effie. He's smirking as Caesar congratulates him on keeping his tributes alive, not only through two Games, but through the war as well. "No one's done that before!" encourages Caesar, his smile wide. She wonders how he stays genuine after all they've been through. Haymitch shrugs, looking at his hands.

"I've done a lot of stuff no one's done before. We all have," he says, simply. It's strange to hear Haymitch less than sarcastic, sincere even. He's not lying, not playing up the audience, not trying to make jokes. He's just being honest. He flexes his fingers, undoubtedly thinking of dead children. Maybe even of Prim. She turns back to the babble of her prep team.

Johanna's interview is hilarious at first, as Caesar questions her about Gale and she, exhibitionist as ever, answers with comments that have her best friend blushing more than she's ever seen. But Johanna calms as Caesar asks how she's faring in 2, as it was a Career district. She flushes as she takes in the meaning behind his question: how is she doing in a district where she assisted with the death of so many of its citizens, killed some of them personally? Katniss shushes her prep team with a wave of her manicured hand. Octavia tuts as she looks at Johanna, who is still dumbstruck, staring at Caesar.

"Why in the world did she cut off all that lovely hair?" Katniss rolls her eyes.

"She didn't. It fell out while the Capitol was torturing her."

Johanna's speaking onscreen.

"We're more popular than you'd think," is what she tells Caesar, referring to Gale of course, who trapped workers in the mountain, ensured that they were buried alive.

"What happened in the Games, in the war, was awful, but whatever happened in the past is in the past."

Katniss tears up as Finnick's words are repeated, and even Johanna has to swallow hard. "And we fought the way we did for this: to be sure there would be no career districts, no reapings…no Games."

Caesar's speaking again, but Venia taps Katniss lightly on the shoulder and tells her she needs to get into her dress.  
Her dress is red, and at first she's angry, because why the hell would they put her in something that even vaguely reminds her of fire? But then she sees the embroidery around her rib cage, the way it's gathered on one side of her waist and then drops gently down to almost below her knees, and she knows why. It's as if his presence is in the room. Venia pulls the fabric down, trying with a little more difficulty than usual to secure her garment in place. When she straightens, huffing and puffing, she looks pleased.

"You've gained weight, my dear," she says, and Katniss stares at her. Has she really? She supposes, with Peeta making sure she eats every day, with no Capitol to take food away, no Games to play, that she has been eating more than usual. She smiles, and this feels like a huge victory. The pool of people who can make her smile has been getting wider since Gale and Johanna showed up, has included Haymitch for awhile, but for Venia to make her smile is a huge victory.

Her prep team fusses over the scars on her arms, the scars from all of her skin grafts. They hate the huge one where Johanna dug the tracker out of her arm, but Katniss protests when they begin covering it up.

"It's me," she explains, looking at each of them in term, begging them to understand. "I hid who I was for _so_ long in front of the cameras—please, please, just this once, can I show them?"

The three of them exchange glances, then nod, and again, she feels Cinna's presence. He would've been on her side, she knows it.

They usher her into the same waiting area she'd been in the first Games, when Haymitch had told her of the trouble she'd caused, trouble that sparked from the girl on fire into an inferno, a blaze that saved everything she believed in and destroyed almost everyone she loved.

"Almost everyone," she reminds herself as her podium rises. She blows kisses at her prep team, reminding herself of the girl on the chariot, in the first Games, nervous to hold Peeta's hand. A lifetime ago, really. He has on a black dress shirt and a red tie that matches her dress perfectly. As soon as she sees him, it sets balance back into her world. She's reminded of so many moments, but when she goes into his arms and the audience cheers, she realizes it's the first time she's doing this in front of an audience but not _for_ them. It's an entirely different feeling, one that fills her with joy, makes her feel complete. They settle onto the couch, her legs tucked up under her like they had been a million years ago. Another lifetime, one where she wasn't in love with him, one where she had so few scars, one where Prim was still alive…

Caesar's asked something and she has absolutely no idea what it was. Thank God Peeta's so good at this. If he weren't here, she'd probably just get up, twirl around in Cinna's dress, and go home.

"We're still alive," Peeta tells Caesar, which elicits a nervous laugh from the crowd.

Caesar chuckles. "And still our favorite star-crossed lovers, right, folks?" he asks the crowd, and they roar in approval. They're such a different mix than she's used to: yes, some are still Capitol-esque, dressed in strange clothes, with hair that's an unnatural color. But there are so many _normal_ people there, and she draws strength from this.

"So, tell me, Mrs. Mellark," says Caesar, grinning at her, "when are you going to try for another baby?"

They stare at each other, dumbfounded. Never in a million years had she anticipated this question, and she can see Peeta didn't either. She wants to refute the "Mrs. Mellark" (she is not _Mrs. Mellark_), but is far too thrown by the memories of faking not only a marriage but a pregnancy, a _miscarriage_, that she can't. Instead, she finds her voice before Peeta can jump in to save her. She doesn't need to be saved: she needs to be honest.

"We're not," she tells him simply. She feels her throat tightening, clears it firmly before continuing. "My little sister, Prim, she died just a few blocks from here." Caesar nods, solemnly. The audience is as silent as it was the last time she spoke of Prim.

"I loved her more than anyone," she whispers, feeling tears on her cheeks. She smiles, squeezes Peeta's hand. "Sorry but it's true," she tells him, and he nods. He's never doubted this.

The audience barely manages a titter: they are riveted by her honesty. And in a moment, so pure, she understands: this is why they rebelled. The last time she was on this stage, she was lying, fighting for her life and Peeta's life with every resource available, still sure she would die. And now, she's not here for anyone's entertainment, really. Though they may enjoy being entertained, what they want, what they _need_, is truth. And a country that wants truth, that would rather see her be honest and horrible than lying and charming, that is the kind of society she wants to be part of.

She feels more tears on her cheeks, wipes them away impatiently, sure her make-up is a mess, and she tells Caesar, "She was my best friend, my favorite ally, and I protected her with everything I was and then some."

She chokes up then, has to take a deep breath, and Peeta, still holding her hand, finishes for her. "Prim was the closest thing Katniss ever had to a child," he explains, and she nods.

"Neither of us wants to tarnish that by trying to replace her. She's irreplaceable. And so are all of your children," he continues, turning first to the audience, then to the cameras, "the ones we lost in the rebellion, in the uprisings, and the ones we lost in the Games." She's silent, thinking of Rue. "They were beautiful, and they, too, are irreplaceable. Though we have been fighting for the right things, for justice and truth, there is no replacing those we have lost, and we refuse to forget them."

They smile at each other, tears on both their faces, Caesar completely dumbfounded. Then, in unison, they touch three fingers to their lips and raise them in the air, and around the audience, around the country, everyone follows their lead.

**Reviews make me smile. **


	29. can't survive without

**Hi my lovely readers. You guys are amazing! **

**Also- I'm shamelessly plugging my own fics. That should be embarrassing, but note the word "shameless"? I wrote a one-shot about Johanna and Haymitch having a chat while Gale and Katniss have theirs. I'd love if you'd check it out and tell me what you think. **

******I'm so sad this is coming to an end! This is the last chapter. Thanks for sticking with me! On to the main event! **

**The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins, not to me, though I do enjoy playing with her characters.**

The feast is incredible. For her, it's the best feast she's ever been at because of the absence of tiny stemmed wineglasses and everything they represent. She's circling the room, sampling a bit of everything, while others dance. She finds it amazing that she truly feels affection for these people: for Paylor, who embraces her warmly, for Effie, who kisses her on both cheeks, for Beetee, who's still in his wheelchair but seems to be Johanna's new best friend, and especially for Annie, who comes up holding her infant. Effie coos over the baby, but declines holding him because he might spit up on her sparkling orange outfit (Effie's style, at least, has not changed). Peeta takes Annie up on her offer, cooing at little Finn. He holds the baby with one arm, such a natural with children, letting Finn grasp his index finger with his tiny fist. Despite everything she just said, she must have a look of longing on her face, seeing Peeta with this infant, because Effie pokes her in the stomach and says, "Don't count out having kids just yet!"

Haymitch, lurking in the background, snorts at that, and she agrees with him. But as Effie moves away to chat with someone about their tattoos, Haymitch leans in and whispers in her ear, "He would be a great dad." She nods. He would.

"I can't," she whispers. It feels evil, unnatural, but she is so grateful for her lack of a cycle, for what is essentially infertility. She thinks of how this would be heart-breaking to so many women, especially women who have a man like Peeta, and she thinks again of the cold and calculating truth of her own heart. Haymitch nods and meanders off. She looks at Peeta, who is still holding the baby and chatting with Annie, and she needs to get away. She takes off for the dessert table that has chocolate delicacies on it, starts sampling. She immediately misses Peeta, but assures herself that it's okay; she can go five minutes without him. She doesn't need him, right? She can survive without him?

She's relieved when Gale finds her and drags her onto the dance floor. She's not good at being alone anymore.

It's an hour or so later when Peeta finally catches up with her. She's at a different dessert table, sampling something amazing with caramel and cinnamon, a strange but incredible combination, when she feels a hand on her waist and nose nudging up her neck. He kisses her, gently behind her ear.

"Girl on fire," he whispers. "Do you have any idea what this dress is doing to me?" She ignores him, enchanted with her dessert.

"Nope, don't care," she tells him. "Try this, it's amazing—you need to learn how to make it." She reaches back to feed him the last bite.

"Seriously, it might be my new favorite. Should I get the bakers or—_oh_," she finishes her sentence in more of a moan, because he's pressed himself against her, tightly, and let her feel _exactly_ what this dress is doing to him. At the same time, he's sucking on her fingers as he eats the dessert, moaning in longing that's disguised as good taste at the caramel square.

"Peeta," she mutters as she pulls her hand away, "Not here." But she's on fire too, longing for him suddenly with an ache that's entirely unbearable.

"There's an office that has no windows and a lock on the door in that hallway," he mutters, pointing with the hand that's on her waist.

"Should we leave together or—"

"It's our stars!" And she wilts a little, because she's never had a short conversation with Plutarch. Peeta pulls her closer against him, and she has to bite her lip to stop from making noises that wouldn't be quite appropriate as she's shaking Plutarch's hand. Peeta relinquishes the grasp on Katniss' waist for a moment to shake Plutarch's hand, but he's holding her tight, either unwilling or unable to let her go.

"Now, Mrs. Mellark" (she groans inwardly) "I told you not to be a stranger and I haven't seen you here once since I got off that hovercraft!"

She barely restrains herself from rolling her eyes. "Well, I haven't seen you either," she reminds him. "District 12 isn't that far away."

He laughs appreciatively, takes a sip of wine. Peeta is still on fire behind her, pulling her against him tightly. As Plutarch starts to go off about their plans for 12 and the other districts, Peeta puts his mouth close to her ear so that no one else can hear him and whispers, "It's the second door on the left. Be there in five minutes or I'll start without you." And he lets go of her and disappears, without a word to Plutarch. Plutarch is cut off in the middle of a spiel about 7. He stares after Peeta, then looks at her. She blushes. What the hell is she supposed to tell him? And…and she has to go, can't handle the aching in her for one more second.

"He's just thirsty," she mutters, blushing again, "and I've…I've got to use the washroom, so you'll have to excuse me too…"

She's trailing off, not meeting his eye as she slinks away, and she expects him to be offended. But the word that halts her exit is, "Fascinating."

She turns, stares at him. "What's fascinating?"

"The two of you," says Plutarch, sipping his wine again. "You deserve even more credit than we give you, which frankly is saying something. I never dreamed a hijacking victim could be in the presence of the subject, much less…"

He trails off, raising his eyebrows at her suggestively. She blushes, of course, but is actually interested in what he's telling her.

"That's…unusual?" she asks. "For him to be able to be around me?"

"It's absolutely unheard of," elaborates Plutarch. "Has never happened in human history. But then…I've never heard of a subject who _wants_ to be around the victim. You two are so in love…"

He trails off, glances around, and comes closer to her. She's worried her five minutes might be up, but she has a feeling she needs to hear this.

"Your love is legendary," Plutarch whispers. "Do yourselves a favor and get married."

He winks at her and strides off, and after a moment, she goes to Peeta, a cloud of confusion.

* * *

Get married? Her thoughts whirl with confusion as she sits up on the desk, panting. Peeta's still catching his breath, leaning against her. She's a bit nervous about returning, sure they'll be teased, but they used to pretend to sneak off and do this, so why should it surprise everyone so damn much? _Get married? _

"Let's not go back," he gasps, his forehead against hers, his breath hot against her mouth. "Let's go home and go to bed." She giggles.

"Home's pretty far away," she reminds him, and he nods, buttons his pants.

"Guess we'd better see this through, then," he sighs. "How much flack do you think we're gonna take?" She shrugs, giggles, and lets him lead her back into the party.

The sheer volume of knowing looks cast their way overwhelms her. Her face is on fire.

"We've been watched for _so_ long," she mutters. "That's why we're here, dammit. Why can't they leave us alone for five minutes?"

He snickers. "Give me some credit- that was more than five minutes."

This, obviously, does nothing to improve her flaming cheeks.

"Ignore them," he tells her, kissing her cheek. "You were telling me about that caramel square before I, uh…distracted you." She giggles and leads him off.

A few hours later, he's been dragged onto the dance floor by Johanna. He's blushing hotly, so she has a pretty good idea of what they're talking about. Plutarch has been occupied by Gale, who seems genuinely interested in what he has to say. She's sitting on the stairs with a glass of wine, swirling it and watching everyone mingle. No one seems put out by her constant dropping out of conversations, and the fact remains that even if she were sane enough to keep up with what they're saying (which she's not), she's only heard two words all night.

_Get married? _But she doesn't ever want to get married. She won't put anyone else in a lifetime commitment to her. Sometimes it feels like it's too much to be in that situation herself. But…and now she feels Prim's wisdom, the wisdom of a girl who grew up far too young. Her presence is near this place, so close to where she died, and she hears Prim's voice whisper in her ear, "Katniss, he's already committed to you for life. There's nothing you could do that would change that." And instantly, she knows it's true. Nothing could make Peeta leave her now. Their love defies any natural connections: they'd both rather see the other live than live themselves; they're victim and subject choosing to be together; they defied generations of single-victor Games and survived together, hand in hand. Their togetherness is what makes them strong enough to be a threat to Snow, to the Capitol, but it also makes them strong enough to survive _anything_ together, even life. In Prim's wisdom, she realizes, lies the truth that if she were to trust anyone to stay with her for the rest of her life, she should be trusting Peeta far more than she trusts herself. But…_married?_

"What's wrong with your face?" asks Haymitch, coming up to drop beside her on her stair, a glass of what she thinks is brandy in his hand. He's not as drunk as she thought he'd be by now.

"Nothing's wrong with my face," she retorts. "They redid my make-up after the interview."

"But not after your little tryst in the hallway," he mutters, rolling his eyes. She blushes.

"Doesn't anyone have anything better to talk about than my sex life?" she demands hotly. He snorts.

"Sweetheart, I can't think of anything I'd like discussing less," he mutters. "Unless it's the damage alcohol has on your liver." He's glaring darkly at Effie, who's holding little Finn now, apparently drawn in by his charm.

"All anyone can talk about tonight is how Peeta and I should have babies or how great our love is or that we should…get married." She mutters this last one, partly hoping he won't hear it, but his snort of derision makes it clear that he has.

"Who the hell said that?" he wonders. "Everyone thinks you _are_ married."

"Plutarch said it," she tells him, "and no, _everyone_ does not think we're married." Her eyes slide, almost inadvertently, to Peeta, still on the dance floor. Haymitch sighs.

"Sweetheart, Plutarch only said that because he's dying to throw you a Capitol wedding." He's placating her. She shakes her head, angry that she's even having this conversation.

"Whatever. It doesn't matter." He chuckles at that.

"Right," he agrees sarcastically. "Doesn't matter at all, that's why you're sulking in the corner looking like you swallowed a lemon."

"I always sulk in the corner at parties. I've got the charm of a dead slug," she shoots back, angry. He sniggers.

"Something like that," he agrees. They drink in silence for a minute.

"You don't think we should, do you?" she asks. Because this is almost as true of a test as asking herself. He proved their sameness when they voted for the Capitol Games, when he was with her, his Mockingjay, up until the very end.

"Capitol weddings are gaudy and stupid, and I was never all that fond of having to walk you down the aisle—"

"I'm not asking about a Capitol wedding, Haymitch." As if he didn't already know that. He sighs, finishes his drink.

"When you told the story about the bread…"

He's struggling for words, but she realizes when she looks at him that he's wanted to say this for a long time, has held back out of respect for both of them.

"It just struck me as…interesting that when our District honours marriage with that stupid ceremony, that's how things started with the two of you."

"It was the only thing he remembered, post-hijacking?"

"Yeah. Real," he affirms her. She nods. "It's fascinating that your relationship began with a toasting, of sorts. You've needed each other since that moment, you know. That's when your story began. And…it'd be a fitting conclusion, wouldn't it? You committing to love forever the same way it all started?" He shrugs. "I need another drink, sweetheart." He pats her knee as he gets up.

Her mind is whirling, his words too much all at once. Because they're true, every single one of them. And it's here, on the steps of the banquet hall at the Capitol, just blocks from where she overheard Gale and Peeta's conversation in the first place, blocks from where Prim died, that she finally concedes defeat and accepts the truth that she's been fighting for almost a year. She needs him. Katniss will choose whoever she thinks she can't survive without? She cannot survive without him, never could, even before the Games. And the way her heart feels when her mind finally admits this confirms it beyond any shadow of a doubt. So when Peeta sinks down beside her on the step a moment later, laughing and starting to tell her a story, she cuts him off with a kiss.

"I can't live without you," she tells him. "I never could. I need you."

He nods, looks at her strangely.

"I know," he whispers. "Does this mean that you do?" She nods, feeling tears on her face, dripping onto a smile that's meant just for him, just for this moment that he's waited for for so long.

_The End _

**Your reviews make me so happy- you guys rock. Epilogue to follow. **


	30. epilogue

**My lovelies: here's the very end. I'm both honoured and humbled by the way you've all stuck with me. I feel so blessed. Thank you for all your favorite-ing and reviews and love. **

**For anyone who's interested (you need to take the spaces out):**

**Katniss' dress from last chapter: **images?q=tbn : ANd9GcTEvmed EeqwnoTq ZynnUY9n0P_6WvFcDo_X ASsPc7w5wm D5FDuLug

**Katniss' dress from this chapter: **images?q=tbn : ANd9Gc TTFGzicm QlGN5aGBU Whuv3o5Bdsr Rt6JuYu WMdTwi694iryK2P7A

**Enjoy. It's a bit fluffy, but I feel like they've earned it.**

**The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins, not to me, though I do enjoy playing with her characters.**

She stomps into Haymitch's house, furious, two weeks after their trip to the Capitol, throwing meat pies on the counter with unnecessary vigor. She can't find him, finally looks in the backyard, and sees him corralling geese, of all things. She stares.

"What the hell are you doing?"

He glowers at her, smacks a goose that snaps at his heel.

"Effie said I needed a hobby."

"Oh, and farming geese is what's in nowadays?" she asks, her fury subsided for the moment.

He jumps onto the porch with her. "She cut off my alcohol until I find something else to fill my time with. Do you have a camera?"

He catches on a moment later, because normally Haymitch-the-goose-trainer would have her rolling on the ground laughing. She's happier now.

"Sit," he demands, pulling out a deck chair. "And shut up!" he yells at the geese. She cracks a smile.

"Now, what the hell's wrong with you? Are you mad that Delly's doing so well with the herbs?"

She stares at him for a moment before the meaning sinks in. It's true that Delly is doing incredibly well: will probably take over heading up the job from Katniss in a month or two. She doesn't have the book memorized the way Katniss does, but she has a natural talent for finding the right plants, much in the same way she has a natural talent for finding the good in people.

"No," she assures him, "Of course not. I'd rather hunt anyways."

"Is it town, then?" he asks. "Things are really going up over there. You still wanna make a run for it?"

She rolls her eyes, swats at him half-heartedly. Running off into the woods had been the perfect solution in a Capitol-run, Games-filled world. She isn't living in that world anymore.

"I don't want to make a run for it," she tells him. "At least, not now. You keep training those geese, though—"

"Then why the hell'd you come stomping over here, looking for attention first thing in the morning?"

"It's four o'clock in the afternoon."

"Whatever! What do you want?"

And now that it's come to this, she crosses her arms and pouts, rethinking whether she really wants to talk about it or not.

He glares at her. "Out with it, sweetheart. I don't have all day." The geese honk as if to verify this statement.

"He hasn't asked me," she spits out, her cheeks flaming.

He stares at her, then throws back his head and laughs, the geese honking with him, making it sound magnified, like the whole world is laughing at her. She gets up, furious, embarrassed, but he pulls her back down, wipes tears of laughter from his eyes.

"I'm sorry, sweetheart, I am. It's just—this is the first time you've ever come to me with a _normal_ problem. I was caught off guard."  
"This isn't normal!" she insists.

"Oh, woe is me, my boyfriend won't propose," he whimpers, mimicking her voice. She swats him and he dodges it.

"Well, he won't! What the hell? He's the one who actually cares!"

Haymitch chuckles. "Yeah, you're over here telling me all about it because you _don't _care, right?" She glares at him. Haymitch takes a deep breath, clearly trying to calm himself.

"Sweetheart, who was in on that conversation we had in the Capitol?" She sighs, thinks back.

"Just you and I," she recites. She hates this, feels as if he's being condescending, but all he's doing is mentoring her. He's still their mentor.

"Have you told Peeta anything about that conversation?"

"Of course not!" she snaps, angry that he would even need to ask. She realizes, a moment later, that he didn't need to ask, knew the answer all along.

"He doesn't know that I…" She trails off, lost in memories. Haymitch interrupts her thoughts.

"You're the one who changed your mind," he explains, and he looks at his flask for moment before taking a reserved sip. She smiles; maybe Effie's onto something. "And for the record, this is not the first time you've changed your mind." She blushes, thinking of their feigned romance. "I don't think it's the last either, but that's not the point. You've changed your mind, over and over, and he waits for you pretty damn patiently. Besides, if you really think about it, he's already proposed to you."

"That wasn't—" He raises his eyebrows at her as she stops short, realizing his meaning. Peeta has already proposed to her. He's the one who's already thrown himself unreservedly into this. He was always all in, has never changed his mind. She gets up, determined to find the right kind of bread, and Haymitch clears his throat.

"Thanks," she mutters.

"You want me to walk you down the aisle?" he teases. She smirks. "You seem a little busy with these geese, so I'll pass for now," she teases.

"If you two can tear yourselves away for five minutes, call Effie?" he requests.

"I'm not getting in between you two!" she giggles. She scampers off, dodging the empty bottle he throws at her.

The only place to get their bread is the bakery (logical, though she searched every cupboard before she gave in). Peeta isn't out front when she gets there: apparently he's baking faster than humanly possible while he lets Sae run the till. She wants to see him though, so she takes a bowl of Greasy Sae's soup, gulps it down sitting on the counter like old times. When he still hasn't come out front, she realizes it might be the best surprise she could ever give him. So she buys a loaf of bread full of nuts and raisins, feeling more nervous than she's ever felt in her life.

She gets home and, for the first time in over a year, heads into the basement and gazes at Cinna's gowns. She's come to realize that losing people does not mean losing their memories and it cannot mean forgetting them or ignoring what they've given. She'll never heal if she walks away: at some point, you have to turn around and face not only what wants to kill you, but what wants to keep you alive. And their memories will keep her alive, if she'll let them.

Her closet seems to be color-coded, so she heads away from the darks and toward the light colors. She wants to avoid the plethora of wedding gowns at the end of the rack but finds herself inexorably drawn to them. She wonders if her Mockingjay dress is here, even though the sane part of her mind insists that it's not. Drawn to something dark on a white dress, she pushes past chiffons and silks and a mess of crinoline to find a black envelope.

She pulls out the dress it's tacked onto. It's a beautiful white gown, nothing like the ostentatious dresses that surround it. It's simple, but elegant, and it's impossible not to feel Cinna's presence. She's sure he did the embroidery by hand: swirls that conjure up leaves in her forest, plants in her Meadow. She opens the envelope, unfolds the note inside. It makes her ache, but not entirely in a bad way.

_Remember, girl on fire, I'm still betting on you…but know that I was always betting on him. _

Cinna's last words, repeated and combined with an assurance that Peeta was always right for her, that those who knew her best never doubted, assures her more than anything else. She puts on the dress, looking in the mirror and giggling. Her cheek is smudged with dirt, her eyebrows unkempt, her hair coming out of its' braid. But in so many ways, it's perfect: her dress is not a dress for a Capitol bride with waxed eyebrows and shiny hair. It's for _her_. She will match Peeta's sweaty work clothes and flour-smudged cheeks perfectly. This is their wedding, and no one else's.

She slices the bread, sets it on a plate, gets tongs ready for the toasting, sets out tinder and firewood, scrubs under her nails. She's stalling. She has not lit a fire, not _touched_ a match, since she was lit on fire herself. She's not the girl on fire anymore. She takes a deep breath, closes her eyes.

The first match goes out immediately. The second one lasts long enough for her to shriek and drop it. The third she throws at the tinder, missing, and it lands among ashes from a very long time ago. When was the last time someone lit a fire in this grate? And the fact that it might have been Prim gives her strength to light the fourth match, set the tinder ablaze, and wait for him.

It's dark when she hears his footsteps on the porch. He's wary; must've seen the smoke from the chimney.

"Katniss?" he asks, looking for her.

"I'm here," she calls from the living room, sitting on the couch in her white dress. The moment he sees her, she just asks.

"Will you marry me?"

She sees his shocked eyes take in the bread, the dress, and most of all the _fire_, which was always going to be the hardest part. A tear falls from his eye, but he wipes it away impatiently.

"_Yes_._" _

She smiles.

He goes to her, kissing her gently, tantalizingly. He sees the bread she's chosen, grins at her, gets a slice on the tongs, but she stops him. She has something to say. When did she become the one who was good with words?

"I'm done putting on a show for the Capitol," she whispers. "I'm done putting on a show for anyone or faking anything. Never again will I pretend I feel something I don't. I'm not doing this because I'm supposed to, or because I think I should, or because I think I _owe_ you for anything, from then—" She gestures to the bread, "to now. I am doing this because I love you more than anything. I _need_ you, Peeta. I can't survive without you."

The way she says it changes Gale's words, makes them romantic, beautiful. She takes the tongs from him, toasts her piece, and feeds it to him. His tongue licks her fingers.

She puts his piece on the tongs, hands it to him. He's gazing at her in wonder.

She's just realized that this is unfair: that she had so much time to think of what she wanted to say, and that he's had none, when he begins to speak.

"I have wanted this forever," he begins, eloquent as always. His lack of prep time is clearly not an issue. "I can't remember a time when I didn't want to marry you. I know that we're broken, that a part of us always will be. But you are the only one who makes me feel like I should keep on living. I need you to survive. I love you more than life. I can't imagine choosing to exist without you. The last time I told you I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you, I thought I'd only live a few more days. When I say it now, I say it with the expectation that we will live for years, and that we will heal and love and grow old together. Katniss, I will always want to spend every single moment of the rest of my life with you."

He toasts his piece, feeds it to her. They cling to each other, breathless and exhilarated.

And in a moment so beautiful, she gazes into his eyes and sees her whole life come full circle: from the bread he tossed her to feed herself, feed Prim, to this moment, right now, tears shining in both of their eyes, she has needed him. Now they are married, not for anyone else but for themselves. And for the first time since they were reaped, Peeta and Katniss are more than just pieces in the Games.

**(My) reviewers make me smile. **


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